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Soros, Lewis, and Sperling
Not Going to “Win Every Time” in 2002

By Sue Rusche
Chairman, President, and CEO
National Families in Action
November 1, 2002

In the 2000 election, George Soros, Peter Lewis, and John Sperling sponsored Proposition 36, a “treatment not jail” initiative, in California. It won by a large majority, and was the latest in a string of successful “drug reform” measures for “medical marijuana,” “treatment not jail,” and “forfeiture reform” they have financed in several states since 1996.

Emboldened by their apparent unstoppable “war on the war on drugs,” as they call it, the Soros group’s campaign operatives announced they were coming to the heartland in 2002, bringing similar initiatives to Michigan, Ohio, and Florida. Declaring their victory with Proposition 36 signaled that voters were “way ahead of politicians,” disgusted with the war on drugs, and clamoring for a major shift in drug policy, the Soros folks confidently predicted they would win in all three states in 2002.

It’s not going to happen. The fact that it’s not signals that voters have begun to see through the “drug reform” hype to the real campaign, overturning the nation’s drug laws, a step that poll after poll shows Americans reject. Knowing voters don’t want legal drugs, in 1996 the Soros camp turned to the states, specifically those that permit ballot initiatives, to finance measures that chip away at the drug laws and move towards legalization in increments.

Bill Zimmerman, who has directed nearly all the initiative campaigns funded by George Soros, Peter Lewis, and John Sperling, put it succinctly at the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML) in 2000:

“Our polling shows that only a small minority of Americans wants to change drug policy. . .20 percent at best when you talk about legalizing drugs. So you need to educate them, help them understand that the position they’re taking is wrong, ill-formed, misguided, whatever.”

The way “to move people where we want them to go,” he continued, is to put forward initiatives that “have been crafted by public opinion polling and focus group research so that we know exactly how far people are willing to go.”

Approaching drug legalization incrementally, he argued, works. It allows us “to project that ‘we win every time on this issue,’” which is important he said, “because that puts increasing pressure on the federal government [to repeal the drug laws].”

Americans are a compassionate people. If you tell them that smoked marijuana is medicine, they’ll try to make it available for sick people. If you tell them the jails are filled with nonviolent drug offenders who need treatment, they’ll try to get it for them. If you tell them that law enforcement officers are wasting time hunting down “nonviolent marijuana users instead of murderers and rapists,” they’ll try to fix that too.

But if you lie about these things, if you make medical claims for smoked marijuana that are not supported by science, if you grossly inflate the number of first- and second-time drug users who are in jail, if you sponsor initiatives and promote just one of these provisions, but pack them with others you don’t tell voters about, voters will eventually figure it out – and send you packing!

And that seems to be what’s happening this year. The Soros group is not going to “win every time” in 2002. Voters have begun to realize they’re being lied to and are fighting back.

--Peter Lewis financed an initiative, Question 9, in Nevada through the Marijuana Policy Project that would legalize marijuana outright. It would force the state to grow marijuana, tax it, and sell up to 3 ounces per purchase in retail stores. Proponents call 3 ounces “small amounts.” Las Vegas police officers rolled 3 ounces of confiscated marijuana and found that 3 ounces makes 255 joints! Once they understood the initiative, Nevadans started fighting back. Polls there show it will go down in flames by 60 to 34 percent.

--When they promoted Proposition 36 in California 2 years ago, the Soros camp told voters California’s prisons were filled with first- and second-time drug offenders who needed treatment rather than jail. Compassionate voters passed the initiative overwhelmingly. But six months after its implementation, the Los Angeles Times reported that Prop 36 participants had an average of not 1 or 2 previous arrests, but 14 previous arrests, 3 felony convictions, and 5 misdemeanor convictions! What’s more, 50 percent of drug offenders either never showed up for treatment or failed to complete it. They’re back out on the street using drugs again, committing crimes again, being re-arrested and recycled through California’s now overwhelmed treatment system. The result? Prop 36 is failing at least half the people it promised to help.

The three heartland states have some of the most effective drug reform systems in the nation. Listen to Chief Justice Thomas J. Moyer and Justice Alice Robie Resnick of the Ohio Supreme Court in a letter they wrote in September to George Soros, Peter Lewis, and John Sperling about the initiative, State Issue 1, they are sponsoring in Ohio:

Under Ohio sentencing laws revised in 1995, judges in all courts report they are sentencing nearly all first- and second-time low-level drug offenders into treatment rather than incarceration. In effect, State Issue 1 focuses on a problem that has already been addressed. Yet your campaign staff in Ohio persists in presenting sentencing numbers in such a way as to suggest, falsely, that most low-level first- and second-time offenders are being incarcerated. . . .We ask you to consider how the campaign you are funding ill suits the situation in Ohio and misleads voters about the overall progressive posture of our drug laws.

Voters in Florida and Michigan didn’t like the Soros group’s initiatives any better than the Ohio Supreme Court justices did.

– Voters fought back with legal challenges in Florida that prevented the Soros group from collecting enough signatures to even get the initiative on the state’s ballot.

– Voters fought back with legal challenges in Michigan that removed the Michigan initiative from the ballot because proponents had failed to follow the law when they collected signatures.

– The only heartland state in which the Soros group managed to succeed in placing an initiative on the ballot is Ohio, and voters there are fighting back fiercely. Ohio First Lady Hope Taft organized an amazing coalition of grass roots groups to educate voters about the real mission of the Soros group’s State Issue 1. The coalition, Ohioans Against Unsafe Drug Laws, is fighting to protect drug addicts, to ensure they get real treatment instead of getting thrown out on the street and abandoned, as is happening in California. It’s fighting for public safety, to make sure drug offenders convicted of nondrug-related crimes serve their sentences instead of being turned out of jail to commit more crimes. Its fighting to strengthen, not weaken, drug courts, which hold out the best hope for providing real treatment to drug offenders so they can recover. It’s fighting to ensure that the Ohio Constitution doesn’t end up with a $270 million bill that has to be paid first, before any money can be allocated for education, health care, and other needs Ohioans have. Polls indicate that State Issue 1 will be roundly defeated.

So what does it all mean? Are voters signaling they want to end the drug war? Or, by rejecting the Soros group’s 2002 initiatives, are they signaling that lying to voters no matter how many millions are spent ultimately doesn’t work. We’ll know November 5th.

Scorecard

George Soros, Peter Lewis, and/or John Sperling have funded the following “drug reform” initiatives: