Blaring Bob Marley tunes on a boombox and waving signs that simply read "Legalize Marijuana," about a dozen or so supporters of Independent Florida Attorney General Candidate Jim Lewis and his effort to make weed legal in the Sunshine State descended on the Broward County Courthouse for a pro pot rally Tuesday morning.
The 51-year-old former prosecutor looked somewhat out of place in a shirt and tie standing next to the mostly dredlocked group assembled, including a man dressed head-to-toe as the green sticky icky with a sign reading "It's not just for glaucoma anymore."
But Lewis' message and purpose, the decriminalization of marijuana, fit right in.
"We're trying to get people to realize the statistics and the studies show that marijuana is less injurious to the public health than is alcohol and cigarettes," said Lewis. "These folks are out here for many reasons, but they all want to legalize marijuana and this is a position that I've decided to take in seeking the position of Florida Attorney General."
Lewis, a long shot at best for the AG's office, said the pot issue is just as important as others, especially in Florida.
"I think it's real important. We've talked about immigration, we've talked about the lawsuit for Obama-care, now we're really talking about something that's close to the people's heart and those people, not just the people that use marijuana, but there are people out there that need marijuana because they have MS or cancer or some serious disease," he said.
He added that the money flow that would come with legalization would outweigh any possible harm.
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"The money that's being spent on locking people up and incarcerating people for marijuana possession goes into the hundreds of millions in our state," said Lewis. "Over 25 million people in this country regularly use marijuana, that probably means at least over a million people in Florida and it's just crazy to keep filling up our prisons and jails with these people and using these resources when we need these prison beds for dangerous offenders."
Lewis pointed to states like California, where marijuana legalization is helping with the economic downturn.
"Another thing that legal marijuana will bring to us as it's bringing to California, it'll bring jobs and it'll bring tax reliefs," he said. "We can tax marijuana like we do alcohol and cigarettes and it'll be a great economic boon, it'll give our economy the munchies."
