Maryland Gov. Wes Moore poised to issue pardons for 175,000 for weed convictions

Maryland Gov. Wes Moore is issuing pardons for more than 175,000 cannabis convictions, one of the country’s most expansive efforts to provide relief to people with old nonviolent offenses.

Maryland legalized possession and sales of marijuana for adults on July 1 of last year, after voters overwhelmingly backed a referendum.

Moore, the nation’s only Black governor who is viewed as a budding star in national Democratic circles and possible 2028 presidential candidate, said the move to forgive low-level weed possession charges is in line with a campaign promise to make Maryland more equitable. He added that it will also help remove systemic barriers that disproportionately impact Black and brown residents of the state.

“We know that legalization does not turn back the clock on decades of harm that was caused by this war on drugs,” Moore said during remarks at a ceremony in Annapolis, the state capital.

“We cannot celebrate the benefits of legalization if we do not address the consequences of criminalization,” Moore added.

The executive action Moore signed will pardon tens of thousands of people with nonviolent marijuana possession and paraphernalia charges, some of which date back more than 40 years.

The first-term governor also noted during his remarks that people with past criminal convictions can have that used against them to deny them employment, housing and even access to education, causing detrimental effects long after the original crime was committed or prison time has been served.

Moore touted what he said is the nation’s “most successful rollout of the recreational cannabis market,” which included 174 social equity applicants who now have licenses to sell marijuana in the state.

That’s important, the governor added, because when voters approved legalization it didn’t erase the fact that half of the drug arrests for cannabis in the state were for marijuana possession — or that Black Marylanders were three times more likely to be arrested than their white counterparts.

“The mandate that the people gave us was about recreational use. The mandate we gave ourselves was to right historic wrongs,” Moore told POLITICO in an interview shortly after the announcement.

He sidestepped questions about whether the pardons will help give him a boost in any future runs for higher office. But Moore did acknowledge his aim was to reverse low-level cannabis convictions being used as a “cudgel” to restrict Black men and boys from being full participants in society.

“If I walk out of this office at the end of my time, and we still have people with cannabis convictions on books [who are] still not able to participate in our society, then what have I done? Then what was the point of me being there?" Moore said in the interview. "And I don't think that that's an extra pressure for me being the only black governor. I think that every governor should feel that way."

The pardons issued by Moore do not automatically clear convictions from a person’s record. But Moore’s aides said all of those pardoned Monday will have a pathway to expunge their records at some point.

Moore is the latest Democratic governor to provide relief for past weed convictions, following the lead of President Joe Biden. He granted clemency to individuals convicted of simple marijuana possession under federal law in October 2022 and urged governors to take similar action for state-level convictions.

“Sending people to prison for possessing marijuana has upended too many lives and incarcerated people for conduct that many states no longer prohibit,” the president said in a statement at the time. “And while white and Black and brown people use marijuana at similar rates, Black and brown people have been arrested, prosecuted, and convicted at disproportionate rates.”

Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey announced a blanket pardon for misdemeanor marijuana possession convictions in March for tens of thousands of people. Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, another prospective 2028 White House hopeful, announced in 2020 that nearly half a million non-felony cannabis related arrest records had been expunged at the state level.

Moore, who was elected in a landslide in 2022, was ushered into office the same year two-thirds of Maryland voters approved a ballot measure that legalized adult use and possession of marijuana. The Democratic-led Legislature made changes to the state law ahead of marijuana becoming legal in the state on July 1, 2023, which allowed for the clearing of criminal convictions for simple possession in cases where that was the only offense.

While campaigning in 2022, Moore vowed that if Maryland voters legalized recreational maijuana, he’d “work to ensure equity within the cannabis industry to rectify the injustices done to those harmed by the war on drugs and mass incarceration.”

Maryland is seeing roughly $100 million in monthly cannabis sales since the state’s medical dispensaries began selling to all adults last year. It is one of 25 states — representing more than half the country's population — that has legalized marijuana possession for anyone at least 21 years old.

Several marijuana policy organizations applauded Moore’s actions on Monday.

“The sheer number of folks who will be pardoned under the actions plus the fact that paraphernalia was included, that does make it significant,” said Maritza Perez Medina, director of federal affairs at the Drug Policy Alliance, an advocacy group that supports drug legalization.

She hopes other states see the benefit the actions can have not just on people with old convictions, but on a state’s economy as well.

“This really does ensure that people have access to education, housing, better jobs," Perez Medina said.

Earlier this year, Biden reiterated that no one should be imprisoned for cannabis use, while also highlighting his administration’s efforts to review whether federal marijuana restrictions should be loosened.

Marijuana remains a Schedule I narcotic, which means it is determined to have no medical benefits while also being a substance with a high potential for abuse, on par with drugs like heroin and LSD.

In August, the Department of Health and Human Services issued a 252-page cannabis review, concluding that it is less harmful than other dangerous drugs and acknowledging evidence of some medical benefits. The agency recommended reclassifying marijuana as a Schedule III drug and the Justice Department is moving forward with that recommendation.