Lawmaker tries pot ahead of medical marijuana vote

SALT LAKE CITY – A Utah lawmaker drove to Las Vegas and tried marijuana for the first time ahead of the statewide vote on a proposition to legalize its use for Utah residents with qualifying medical conditions.

Sen. Jim Dabakis wanted to try cannabis before the vote, a Salt Lake City TV station reported.

Dabakis selected an edible gummy bear for the test, saying legislators should at least try marijuana before it was up for a vote.

Dabakis, a Salt Lake City Democrat, said in a Facebook video in front of a dispensary that it’s “not a big deal.”

“I wouldn’t recommend it as sheer candy,” he added. “It’s kind of bitter.”

Many lawmakers have said they didn’t support Proposition 2, which was approved by voters this week, but others said they would support a medical cannabis compromise that’s set to be discussed in a special legislative session after the election.

“It dawned on me (last) Wednesday on the floor of the Senate that the Legislature is going to have the final say on this medical marijuana,” Dabakis said.

Looking around at the other legislators, the senator said something bothered him.

“I thought, ‘Maybe nobody on this floor has ever tried marijuana,'” Dabakis said. “I think if the Legislature would actually try it they would find it and realize this is no big deal, and at least let those who are suffering have the help that they need.”

Laws aimed at trespassing activists struck down

CHEYENNE – Two Wyoming laws that prohibit trespassing to collect environmental data violate the U.S. Constitution’s free-speech protections, a judge ruled in siding with two environmental groups and a news photographer association.

Wyoming officials moreover failed to demonstrate the laws are necessary to discourage environmentalists from documenting damage to streams and grasslands because of livestock grazing, U.S. District Judge Scott Skavdahl ruled recently.

“There is simply no plausible reason for the specific curtailment of speech in the statutes beyond a clear attempt to punish individuals for engaging in protected speech that at least some find unpleasant,” Skavdahl wrote in his ruling.

The laws prohibit trespassing to collect resource data on private land and also trespassing on private land to collect data on public land. Skavdahl ordered Wyoming to not enforce the statutes with regard to trespassing on private land to collect data on public land.

The two similar laws are an example of so-called “ag-gag” statutes states have enacted to shield the agriculture industry from monitoring by environmentalists and animal-welfare activists. Federal judges have struck down laws in Utah and Idaho that made it a crime to make undercover recordings at farms and slaughterhouses.

Two environmental groups, the Natural Resources Defense Council and Western Watersheds Project, along with the National Press Photographers Association sued to contest the laws.

It doesn’t appear that anybody has been prosecuted under the laws because they were enacted in 2015 and revised in 2016, said a spokesman for Western Watersheds Project.

State lottery to offer game linked to sporting events

ALBUQUERQUE – The New Mexico Lottery Authority is moving ahead with plans for a new game that will be tied to the outcome of sporting events.

The lottery board voted unanimously recently in favor of the new game, which could go on sale in four to six months.

The move is the first by a state government to cash in on a U.S. Supreme Court ruling earlier this year that struck down a federal law that largely prohibited sports betting outside of Nevada.

Santa Ana Pueblo became the first tribe in New Mexico to offer sports betting at its casino, and studies show sports betting in the state could potentially bring in more than $1 billion annually.

Lottery CEO David Barden said the lottery’s sports game will generate $30 million a year, with $9 million of that going to the lottery-funded tuition-assistance program for New Mexico college students.

The goal is to make the lottery more attractive to younger generations, Barden said. “It’s not your grandmother’s lottery game,” he said.

Details of the game are being worked out, but officials say it will involve a parlay-like wager. A player will pick possible outcomes of at least three sporting events and will have to choose all correctly to win.

The game will be operated by Intralot, the lottery’s contractor for its numbers games such as Powerball and Roadrunner Cash. Intralot operates lottery sports games in several other countries.

NEBRASKA

Ben Sasse doubts Trump will face a real GOP challenge in 2020

Nebraska Republican Sen. Ben Sasse, who has at times criticized the style and substance of President Donald Trump, said this week it was unlikely the president would face a strong primary challenger in 2020.

Sasse said that was because Trump, “has captured the majority of the Republican Party over the course of the last 2 1/2 years. The Republican Party electorate is pretty comfortable with the ‘anti’ positions that President Trump takes on a lot of issues.”

Speaking at a National Press Club luncheon in Washington, D.C., Sasse also said it was unlikely he could see himself making a run for the White House.

“I honestly spent 16 months cleaning up then-2-year-old baby vomit off the floor of a campaign bus, and the thought of doing that in 50 states instead of just 93 counties sounds absolutely terrible,” Sasse said.

He also said he was intentionally not thinking about whether to seek another Senate term in two years.

Reporter warns Rep. Gianforte not to lie about 2017 attack

HELENA, Montana – U.S. Rep. Greg Gianforte has intentionally misled voters and the media about his attack on a reporter last year as the Montana Republican campaigned for re-election, the reporter’s attorney said in a recent letter.

Ben Jacobs’ attorney, Geoffrey Genth, sent a cease-and-desist letter threatening to cancel Jacob’s agreement not to sue Gianforte if the congressman doesn’t stop. Genth told William Mercer, Gianforte’s attorney, to preserve all documents about the attack in case they are needed as evidence.

“Please advise your client that he and his spokespersons need to stop – immediately and forever – telling lies about the assault, about their own prior lies, about your client’s ‘settlement agreement’ with Ben, or about any other aspect of this matter,” Genth wrote.

Gianforte spokesman Travis Hall declined to comment on the letter. “Greg regrets what happened and has taken full responsibility for it,” Hall said in a statement.

The attack against Jacobs re-emerged as a campaign issue for Gianforte, who successfully defended his seat against Democratic challenger Kathleen Williams. In the closing weeks of the campaign, Williams released an ad with audio of the scuffle from Jacobs’ recorder, with the ad saying, “This is not who we are.” (Gianforte defeated Williams this week by 8 percentage points.)

President Donald Trump praised Gianforte for the attack during a rally in late October in Missoula. “Any guy that can do a body slam – he’s my kind of guy,” the president said.

Gianforte pleaded guilty to misdemeanor assault after throwing Jacobs to the ground when the reporter tried to ask him a question the day before the special congressional election Gianforte won in 2017 to complete the term of Ryan Zinke, who was named Interior Department secretary.

Jacobs agreed not to sue after Gianforte donated $50,000 to the Committee to Protect Journalists and wrote a letter acknowledging that Jacobs didn’t initiate the attack. Gianforte initially told police that Jacobs attacked him first, and his campaign at first released a statement repeating that Jacobs was the aggressor.

Gianforte told the editorial board of the Missoulian newspaper that he recounted to police what he remembered about the assault – that Jacobs attacked him first – and that he was bound by the settlement agreement not to talk about the assault, the newspaper reported recently.

Those comments led to Genth’s letter. Gianforte’s remarks aim to conceal his responsibility for the attack and his dishonesty about it, Genth wrote. There also is no confidentiality provision in the agreement and nothing keeping Gianforte from answering questions about the attack and his statement to police, the lawyer added.