Marijuana reform activists have created a new super PAC aimed exclusively at defeating Texas Republican Rep. Pete Sessions, the House Rules Committee chairman who has blocked cannabis reform legislation from reaching the House floor.
Marijuana Policy Project founder and former Executive Director Rob Kampia is leading the effort, which he said is crucial to legalizing medical marijuana federally and affirming federalism for recreational pot, two policies supported in principle by President Trump.
“Everyone knows who he is and that he’s our biggest problem on Capitol Hill. Half of my job has already been done by Pete Sessions himself,” Kampia told the Washington Examiner. “All I’m going to do is pass the hat.”
Sessions, representing the Dallas suburbs since 1997, won re-election without a Democratic challenger in 2016. But he appears vulnerable as the area becomes increasingly diverse. Hillary Clinton beat Trump in the district by about 2 percentage points in 2016.
Kampia left MPP last year and now leads the Marijuana Leadership Campaign, a small group with a narrower agenda. He recently registered the super PAC, called Texans Removing Outdated and Unresponsive Politicians, ahead of a Wednesday donor meeting in New Orleans.
“[Sessions] is in fact what I call a sphincter who is constipating the process,” Kampia said. “The reason we haven’t won is just process; it’s not content.”
Kampia aims to raise $500,000, which he believes he can do after “having raised $4 million a year for this issue” at MPP, where he oversaw a variety of state efforts, including a major role in Colorado’s 2012 recreational legalization campaign.
In addition to the super PAC, which can independently spend unlimited amounts, Kampia plans to bundle contributions for the Democrat who wins a May 22 runoff primary and provide support for Libertarian candidate Melina Baker.
“I am going to bundle a whole bunch of checks and send them to the Democrat without talking to the Democrat. You are going to see a bunch of $2,700 checks flowing from the same people who you’re going to see on our [super PAC] reports,” he said.
The district’s two Democratic contenders, Colin Allred and Lillian Salerno, did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Although he believes their positions are acceptable, Kampia said, “It doesn’t matter if they are good on marijuana — we just need him out.”
The threat of a well-funded attack campaign has influenced politicians in the past. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Fla., for example, softened her opposition on medical pot after wealthy attorney John Morgan vowed to end her political career.
Sessions isn’t backing down, however, with his campaign responding to the new effort with an incendiary statement describing cannabis reform advocates as “liberal merchants of addiction” who he will disregard.
“Congressman Sessions will not be intimidated by liberal merchants of addiction who imperil the safety of our children with illegal narcotics,” his campaign said in a statement to the Washington Examiner.
“Far more people across North Texas appreciate the congressman’s efforts to protect our families by upholding the rule of law,” his campaign said.
Lindy Snider, one well-to-do cannabis reform supporter who plans to donate to the new super PAC, said she’s motivated in part by her father’s experience with the drug while he was dying.
“I am disturbed by politicians like Pete Sessions who vote based on their personal beliefs which not only defy the growing body of science, but also totally ignore polls which illustrate the will of this nation to legalize and reschedule cannabis,” Snider said. “I believe Pete Sessions is a strong contributing factor as to why even medical marijuana patients are technically criminals under federal law, which is a travesty.”
Recent polls show support for legalizing recreational marijuana is about 60 percent nationally, with even greater support for medical marijuana.
Kampia, a political libertarian, said his strategy for the super PAC is to use funds for ads and get-out-the-vote efforts. He plans to target only a small part of the electorate, particularly students at the University of Texas at Dallas and libertarian-leaning Republicans, who he encourages to cast third-party votes, in part over deficit-boosting spending bill votes cast by Sessions.
UT Dallas political science professor Thomas Brunell said Clinton’s victory in the district is a positive indicator for Democrats, but that many factors will influence the outcome, including uncertainty over when there will be a nationwide Democratic wave.
Brunell said UT Dallas was until recently largely a commuter school and is “not an incredibly politically active place.”
“I’d say we are below average on political activity,” he said.
“Students are notoriously fickle” in general when it comes to voting, Brunell added. But he said he can see the logic in Kampia’s plan, as “students seem interested in making marijuana legal more than other people. Perhaps that’s an issue that could get them to the polls.”
“That’s not a bad strategy,” he said. “But I don’t know that that’s going to be enough people.”
The battle over Sessions’ seat will make the congressman better-known outside his district. Attorney General Jeff Sessions, another vocal marijuana opponent, has received more attention for his anti-cannabis moves, but it’s been Rep. Sessions — no relation — who has increasingly outraged activists.
“It’s an easy name to hate,” Kampia said.
Attorney General Sessions withdrew the Cole Memo protecting state-legal recreational pot businesses in January. Rep. Sessions, meanwhile, has blocked floor votes on various measures, including the so-called Rohrabacher-Farr amendment, which passed by wide margins in 2014 and 2015. The amendment shields state medical marijuana programs from federal authorities.
Under federal law, marijuana possession for any reason outside limited research remains a crime, even though more than two dozen states allow medical pot and nine states and the nation’s capital allow adults 21 and older to use the drug recreationally. The Rohrabacher-Farr amendment has survived by its inclusion by Senate negotiators in conference committee reports.
Although there’s been little legislative action, President Trump last month assured Sen. Cory Gardner, R-Colo., that there would be no federal crackdown on state-legal cannabis and that the White House would support marijuana federalism legislation.
“I’d bet all my money that we could legalize medical marijuana but for Sessions,” Kampia said.
