President Donald Trump was accused on Thursday by Sen. Ted Budd (R-NC) of lying about the process of his marijuana policymaking.
Trump reportedly plans an executive order to direct drug agencies to downgrade marijuana from a Schedule I drug, a category reserved for the most dangerous and illegal substances with no recognized medical use, to Schedule III, alongside anabolic steroids and certain moderate painkillers. It's a rare policy issue on which he is aligned with former President Joe Biden, who also directed federal officials to evaluate rescheduling marijuana.
Trump told reporters this week he has not spoken with any GOP senators who oppose his decision. But Budd, who is one of the most outspoken opponents of this policy in the Senate, claims that he did in fact talk to Trump about it, according to Punchbowl News' Andrew Desiderio.
“I don’t want it to be for the lack of me calling,” said Budd. “I called him personally Friday last week and let him know. He said that others had been calling him on the issue. I was aware of people calling him then — against rescheduling. So I knew that my colleagues had been calling him.”
Budd is the author of an open letter, signed by 21 other Republican senators, urging Trump not to go through with deregulating marijuana, which in recent years has become legal for recreational use in around half of all states and for certain medical uses in most states.
"Rescheduling marijuana to a Schedule III drug will undermine your strong efforts to Make America Great Again and to usher in America’s next economic Golden Age," said Budd's letter. "The only winners from rescheduling will be bad actors such as Communist China, while Americans will be left paying the bill."
He went on to warn that mass shootings have a "link" to marijuana use, citing as evidence that "the shooter who attacked a Catholic school in Minneapolis blamed his actions on 'gender and weed' and wrote, 'I wish I never tried experimenting with either.'"