this post was submitted on 01 Feb 2024
230 points (98.7% liked)

News

31426 readers
3046 users here now

Welcome to the News community!

Rules:

1. Be civil


Attack the argument, not the person. No racism/sexism/bigotry. Good faith argumentation only. This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban. Do not respond to rule-breaking content; report it and move on.


2. All posts should contain a source (url) that is as reliable and unbiased as possible and must only contain one link.


Obvious right or left wing sources will be removed at the mods discretion. Supporting links can be added in comments or posted seperately but not to the post body.


3. No bots, spam or self-promotion.


Only approved bots, which follow the guidelines for bots set by the instance, are allowed.


4. Post titles should be the same as the article used as source.


Posts which titles don’t match the source won’t be removed, but the autoMod will notify you, and if your title misrepresents the original article, the post will be deleted. If the site changed their headline, the bot might still contact you, just ignore it, we won’t delete your post.


5. Only recent news is allowed.


Posts must be news from the most recent 30 days.


6. All posts must be news articles.


No opinion pieces, Listicles, editorials or celebrity gossip is allowed. All posts will be judged on a case-by-case basis.


7. No duplicate posts.


If a source you used was already posted by someone else, the autoMod will leave a message. Please remove your post if the autoMod is correct. If the post that matches your post is very old, we refer you to rule 5.


8. Misinformation is prohibited.


Misinformation / propaganda is strictly prohibited. Any comment or post containing or linking to misinformation will be removed. If you feel that your post has been removed in error, credible sources must be provided.


9. No link shorteners.


The auto mod will contact you if a link shortener is detected, please delete your post if they are right.


10. Don't copy entire article in your post body


For copyright reasons, you are not allowed to copy an entire article into your post body. This is an instance wide rule, that is strictly enforced in this community.

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
 

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has filed lawsuits against five cities -- Austin, San Marcos, Killeen, Denton and Elgin -- ordinances that aim to eliminate enforcement of low-level marijuana possession offenses.

Paxton alleges the cities' actions violate state law and the Texas constitution. The lawsuits ask the courts to declare the ordinances void and order the cities to fully enforce state drug laws.

The ordinances were passed after being approved by voters in local ballot propositions. They prohibit police from making arrests or issuing citations for misdemeanor marijuana possession in most cases.

However, Paxton argues the Texas Local Government Code forbids cities from adopting policies not to fully enforce drug laws. He also says the ordinances violate a section of the Texas Constitution stating that city ordinances cannot conflict with state law.

all 50 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] FartsWithAnAccent@lemmy.world 151 points 2 years ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (10 children)

Texas thinks it gets to ignore the federal government, so why should the cities listen to the state government?

[–] Laughbone@lemmy.world 51 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Exactly, someone should make shirts with a bud that says come and take it.

[–] norbert@kbin.social 17 points 2 years ago

Rules for thee.

[–] TexMexBazooka@lemm.ee 4 points 2 years ago

“Rule for thee but not for me”

It really is that simple

[–] histic@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 2 years ago (1 children)

I mean if a atf agent walked into any legal state they can make all the arrests they want to my knowledge at least if I'm wrong please correct me

[–] ShepherdPie@midwest.social 9 points 2 years ago (1 children)

You may not have seen the recent drama with Texas refusing to allow the feds to patrol the border.

[–] beardown@lemm.ee -1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Yes, but they are correct. Cannabis is a schedule 1 drug at the federal level, same as heroin.

There is nothing legally preventing the federal government from arresting everyone in every state who possesses or sells cannabis. It isn't relevant that cannabis is legal recreationally or medically at the state level in most of the country

We're just hoping that the federal government continues its discretionary policy of looking the other way. But, much like Roe, uncodified rights have a recent habit of disappearing overnight

[–] rambaroo@lemmy.world 2 points 2 years ago (1 children)

The feds gave nothing to do with this. This is about local police

load more comments (7 replies)
[–] Wiggums@lemmy.world 64 points 2 years ago (1 children)

what a huge waste of taxpayer money

[–] ptz@dubvee.org 39 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 children)

Yep, and so are the lawsuits he's filing.

[–] Nougat@kbin.social 43 points 2 years ago (1 children)

So ... it's okay for Texas to ignore SCOTUS about federal border patrol and razor wire, but it's not okay for subsections of Texas to ignore Texas law, got it.

[–] lolcatnip@reddthat.com 11 points 2 years ago (2 children)

Yes, exactly. Republicans see no problem with this.

[–] InternetUser2012@midwest.social 2 points 2 years ago

They have plenty of practice twisting things to fit their narrative. They are all "christians" after all, twisting that bible to meet their needs is a lifelong journey.

[–] ShepherdPie@midwest.social 1 points 2 years ago

This is why they're so effective. They have zero integrity and will use any slimy trick they can to come out ahead.

[–] xantoxis@lemmy.world 25 points 2 years ago (1 children)

This is so fucking weird. Weed is a no-brainer win, even among conservatives. Why double/triple/quadruple down on this stupid policy

[–] beardown@lemm.ee 1 points 2 years ago

Yeah but this allows them to be cruel to liberals. Which is an even bigger win than weed

[–] undercrust@lemmy.ca 24 points 2 years ago (2 children)

Can't let the disproportionately-PoC, vote-stripped, prison slave population drop after all.

[–] xantoxis@lemmy.world 13 points 2 years ago (4 children)

OK, but here's what I don't get. I understand the whole prison-industrial complex thing, but Texas is run by straight up fascists. They'd always be able to come up with something else to put people in prison for. Why weed particularly?

[–] undercrust@lemmy.ca 15 points 2 years ago (2 children)

The cynical-but-statistically-true answer is that this law targets the people that they want to put in jail / don't want to vote. It's a historical, systemically racist piece of law that benefits the incumbents and status quo.

Otherwise they'd have to consider putting people like themselves in prison, or prosecute white collar crime, and that just won't stand for the GOP.

[–] Morgoon@startrek.website 11 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 children)

Also the historically accurate answer according to the men in the room!

“You want to know what this [war on drugs] was really all about? The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. You understand what I’m saying?

We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news.

Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.”

~ John Ehrlichman, Assistant to the President for Domestic Affairs under President Richard Nixon

[–] undercrust@lemmy.ca 2 points 2 years ago

Great quote. God that was such a damning interview.

[–] xantoxis@lemmy.world 3 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

I see where you're coming from, and maybe that even is how they're thinking, but I'm reminded of a joke by John Mulaney. After marijuana was legalized in his state, he declared as much to the audience, and then he asked white people to stop clapping: "It was ALWAYS legal for us." So yes, they do indeed prosecute black people and other PoC more frequently for weed use, but only because they chose to. So, to me, this just emphasizes that they could make any law they wanted work that way. It doesn't matter if it's disproportionately committed by PoC or not, they'll just prosecute that way anyway.

[–] Ageroth@reddthat.com 8 points 2 years ago

If it ain't broke no need to fix it? Weed was never harmful except to authoritarian bottom lines

[–] lolcatnip@reddthat.com 4 points 2 years ago

Because they're lazy and risk-adverse, and they want to stick with what's been working for them, probably.

[–] afraid_of_zombies@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago

Minorities go to jail for it people like me we at most get some kinda rehab probation deal.

[–] Adderbox76@lemmy.ca 6 points 2 years ago

How else are they supposed to compete with Chinese sweatshops if they DON'T have their own workforce they can legally pay pennies per day!?

That there is just good ol' 'murican ingenuity.

/s

[–] thesmokingman@programming.dev 22 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Something that’s really important to understand about Republicans in Texas is they believe in small government so long as it’s their government. In theory, city and county governments should supersede state policy in the same way state policy should supersede federal policy per their defenses. However, that only works so long as city and county policy are in lockstep with state policy. Travis County and Austin almost always have some suit coming from Paxton. All of their was made super evident during 2020 COVID when the state wanted cities to decide things unless you were in Bexar (San Antonio), Travis (Austin), and a few others because those counties took COVID seriously based on their data. Here’s an early escalation where Paxton makes it very clear that the only authority cities have comes from the state executive.

[–] beardown@lemm.ee 4 points 2 years ago

They believe they should be able to do whatever they want, and the law should protect them. They make small government or large government arguments as necessary to achieve that goal. There is no integrity here, so we shouldn't look for it. And we shouldn't act like pointing out their hypocrisy is productive or will persuade them - they're aware of their contradictions and they don't care

[–] Zombiepirate@lemmy.world 18 points 2 years ago

Gotta keep that jazz cabbage off the streets or baby Jesus will cry.

[–] Yewb@kbin.social 17 points 2 years ago

But joe rogan said Texas was a paradise!

[–] Lifecoach5000@lemmy.world 15 points 2 years ago

Ah yes. The criminal Ken Paxton always fighting the good fight! Thanks Ken for again showing how out of touch you are with the modern world.

[–] PPQ@lemmy.world 13 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Shouldn't Paxton be in jail right now....🤔🤔

[–] WeirdGoesPro@lemmy.dbzer0.com 6 points 2 years ago

He should. And then corruption happened, and he got away with it.

Reminding everyone that a record number of democrats crossed the aisle to acquit him on the biggest smoking gun issue they could have impeached him with. Every progressive in Texas should know their names and remember them when it’s time to vote.

You can read all about it here, and article 4 is the smoking gun: https://www.texastribune.org/2023/09/16/ken-paxton-impeachment-vote/

[–] Riccosuave@lemmy.world 12 points 2 years ago

Texas is the shithole country Donald Trump was talking about back in the day, he just didn't know it.

[–] recapitated@lemmy.world 9 points 2 years ago

What a cool party of freedom and personal responsibility

[–] Lifecoach5000@lemmy.world 8 points 2 years ago

Seriously someone save some of that razor wire for this idiot. He’s finally going to have his day in court come April 🙏

[–] lolcatnip@reddthat.com 7 points 2 years ago

Career criminals shouldn't be able to file lawsuits.

[–] Devdogg@lemmy.ml 5 points 2 years ago

Grow the fuck up Paxton!

[–] homesweethomeMrL@lemmy.world 4 points 2 years ago
[–] stratosfear@lemmy.sdf.org -1 points 2 years ago

The real crime is this bullshit when trying to opt out of the fucking cookies...