Hello!
My name is Rezwan Khan and I serve as the President of the Global Alliance for Cannabis Commerce (GACC). I am also a former founding executive committee member of the USCC and founder of the CFA. GACC is the cannabis industry’s most effective voice in DC on legislative, policy, and regulatory issues. We lobby for ending prohibition, fair tax treatment, financial services access, and criminal justice reform on behalf of the industry. GACC aims to create an equitable, diverse, competitive, and vibrant U.S. cannabis industry. Our leadership wanted to share with you some of the incredible bipartisan work that GACC has done over the last 4 years.
First and foremost, we were proud to work with Congresswoman Nancy Mace’s (R-SC) office to help craft and introduce the States Reform Act (SRA), the first-of-its-kind, Republican-led cannabis reform bill supported by Amazon, NORML, and the Cannabis Freedom Alliance—of which GACC is a Steering founder and committee member! I will always cherish the memory of being in front of the US Capitol, speaking at the introduction of the SRA along with our colleagues on CFA.
GACC has also had substantial success with lobbying for Democratic reforms as well. In the final version of Leader Schumer, Senator Wyden, and Senator Booker’s Cannabis Administration and Opportunity Act (CAO), a number of GACC’s suggestions were included in the final text, such as: permitting edibles to be sold, safe harboring existing cannabis products, and implementing a number of social equity provisions involving small socially and economically disadvantaged businesses, and the implementation of a non-user-fee regulatory model (which promotes small and medium sized business product development). We will continue to push for more reforms, such as lowering its excise tax rate.
These two major victories come on the heels of our continued, bipartisan success with the MORE Act and the SAFE Banking Act. GACC was the first cannabis trade organization to endorse and lobby for the MORE Act, helping with committee process, floor whip efforts, and adding co-sponsors. GACC’s also “had a hand in the successful passage of SAFE Banking” in the U.S. House in 2019, according to bill author Congressman Ed Perlmutter (D-CO). GACC has continued to push to pass SAFE since and continues to work to bring the bill across the finish line in the Senate along with our coalition partners. Our work on these bills was instrumental in advancing cannabis reform federally, as they marked the first pro-cannabis reform and cannabis legalization bills to pass congress since 1937!
We are also proud that after several years of pushing for the removal of the Harris/DC rider that prohibits Washington, DC from having an adult-use regulation framework, it has been removed from the House budget and finally has been removed from the Senate federal budget base bill! We have had this success before in the House, but this is the first time the Senate has moved on this issue. There still more work to do until the Senate votes on the budget to ensure the rider is gone for good. But we are thankful for the continued support of the cannabis industry for our efforts. We are hopeful that President Biden will be presented with a budget to sign that permits adult-use regulation in Washington, DC.
Thank you for taking the time to read our quick update, for your commitment to principled reform in the cannabis space, and for your work on our shared goals. If you would like to find out more about GACC, please visit our website at GACC.io or reply to this email to be connected to us!
Sincerely,
Rezwan Khan,
GACC President
