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Since 1996, California laws have permitted citizens to use marijuana "for medical purposes." But the drug remains illegal under federal law, and the Drug Enforcement Agency  regularly  shuts down  cannabis despensaries in the state. Last month John Conyers Jr., chairman of the House judiciary committee, wrote DEA Acting Administrator Michele Leonhart (see below and on the following two pages) questioning the "dramatically intensified … frequency of paramilitary-style enforcement raids" on authorized users and suppliers. Conyers asked for an accounting of the agency's costs for these measures against "individuals who suffer from severe or chronic illness" and for its rationale for threatening landlords of licensed dispensaries with "arrest and forfeiture of their property." Meanwhile, the California State Legislature is considering a measure that would allow state and local law enforcement agencies to refuse cooperation with the DEA.

Barack Obama's presidential campaign told the San Francisco Chronicle last week that if elected president, Obama would curb federal enforcement on state medical marijuana suppliers.

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