 Drug policy reform is many things, but it is foremost a movement for liberty and freedom. Freedom from oppression, freedom from fear, freedom from incarceration, freedom from racism, freedom. That's what we need to keep in mind that that core element of freedom is absolutely pivotal to who we are. It is what unites us with all the other human rights movements that have gone before us and the ones of which we are increasingly becoming a part. More than 1400 people from 71 countries came to Washington D.C. to attend the International Drug Policy Reform Conference organized by the Drug Policy Alliance. There are so many vibrant communities represented at this incredibly colorful meeting. For example, medical marijuana patients, psychedelic researchers, low enforcement officials and harm reducers. There is one goal that unites them all to end the global drug war. The drug reporter video team came to Washington D.C. to learn about the new trends of drug policy reform in the U.S. and around the world. I'm also a part of the New Jersey United for Marijuana Reform, which is about a year old coalition in the state of New Jersey that brings together law enforcement, clergy, civil rights organizations from different communities, medical folks, all to legalize, tax and regulate marijuana for adults. MPP was included in the majority of the medical marijuana programs that we see established now. And we were behind the Colorado Initiative as well as Alaska and bringing legalization to those states. Next year, we're looking forward to legalizing in five more states as well for the 2016 election. More and more, the presidential candidates are willing, even Republicans, willing to say that this needs to be a state's issue. And so we're looking forward to seeing that kind of reform at the federal level much sooner than later. I worked with ramp Republicans against marijuana prohibition. And we just share a conservative message to Republicans about why ending marijuana prohibition and making it legal is consistent with traditional Republican values, safer communities, personal responsibility, fiscal responsibility, medical freedom. What are the experiences so far with legalization in the state of Washington? So the really important news, the headline is that far, far fewer people are getting arrested or put in jail. Some things that are encouraging is we're not seeing an enormous increase in use of marijuana by young people. We're still not effectively doing marijuana education. Legalization has so many models and it can take so many forms. Do you think there are any dangers of choosing the wrong model? Absolutely. I think what happened in Ohio, what almost happened in Ohio, would have been a disaster. To have an oligopoly model written into the state constitution for 10 groups of private investors. Imagine the development in the United States of America. If in the 1700s or 1600s the king of England granted a royal charter to 10 families, only these families could ever grow tobacco. Imagine the kind of aristocracy we would have today. It was the marijuana smokers themselves who said, we don't want this model. On the other states, I think the states, the 50 states are supposed to be laboratories of democracy. And that's the way the system was designed to function. That's what the federal government ought to allow them to do. It's come with different models and the best ones people will adopt. I'm part of 22 Too Many organization. It's a non-profit organization raising awareness on the veteran epidemic suicide. I served a year in Iraq from 2004 to 2005. I was in the infantry and I was a mortarman. Served on the front line, I had guns shot at me. The death that I saw and have had to put on people has messed with me a lot mentally. I've got a lot of grief. I've got a lot of inside mental conflict. How can medical marijuana help people like you? I'm standing here today because of it. If I didn't have access to medical marijuana, I would probably have taken my own life by now. Medical marijuana helps calm me down. MAPS is focused on taking MDMA, assistant psychotherapy through the necessary steps to make it an FDA approved prescription medication. Meaning people have gone through the research is just incredibly inspiring. Hearing their experience and seeing the joy they have in their life and trying to imagine them in a hard time is really reaffirming. We're here to say, ask mom about the casualties of the drug war. We call for a focus on saving lives and ending mass incarceration. My older son spent 11 years psyching through the criminal justice system because he was arrested for marijuana possession. My daughter got up in a Saturday morning, went kayaking with friends and took half a gram of white powder that turned out to be ecstasy. That was 91% pure and she collapsed and died three hours later. We know that drugs are widely available. There's no minimum age, there's no need for ID and there's no label. Now had my daughter had a label with how much ecstasy was in it and dosage and so on, she might still be here. The government has changed recently in Canada. What are your expectations about drug policy changes? Well I can say that the first day I woke up happy since the day my daughter died was the day after the election. And I woke up to know that we had a majority government, a government that was ready for change, a government that would listen to its constituents and actually put into practice what we've been asking for from the conservative government for many years. Do you expect that some new supervised injection sites will be opened in Canada soon? Absolutely, I think the prime minister now when he was running he stood shoulder to shoulder with the mayor of Montreal and it was very clear he supported Montreal's application for three supervised injection sites. Can you explain what was the ruling of the Supreme Court in Mexico around marijuana? A case of four individuals was brought before the court where they were asking for permission to grow and consume cannabis for their personal use. They had requested this as a right, as a human right that's in our constitution. They had asked this of the government, they had been denied and so then they created a legal case against the government saying that they needed access. And the court ruled in favor, four judges, to one saying that in fact it is part of the full and free development of the personality to be able to consume and have substances as long as they don't hurt anyone else around them. This is a mock supervised injection facility and the project is called Safe Shape. We're now starting to reach out and form what is in essence a national alliance of harm reduction organizations, syringe access programs that are dedicated to realizing the vision of supervised injection facilities in virtually every metropolitan area in the U.S. That is the grand goal. Then this year you are awarded for the wonderful work you are doing around harm reduction and overdose prevention, congratulations for that. How do you see the trends around naloxone? It's really a no-brainer when you think about it. Here's a drug that is a pure antidote. It has no effects of its own and we have people dying in huge numbers. Why not make it available to them? Where's the downside? Naloxone, I think because of its simplicity, in 19 years it has cut its swath through the insanity that is the drug war in the United States and that's been really nice to see. Can you tell me about the work vocalist doing in New York City? What are you focusing on now? Right now we are working on a homeless campaign which is our newest campaign. We just, before actually making it to the conference, we were at the mayor's event where he announced about 1,500 units that we're getting back of supportive housing. About a month prior to that we had another victory which was the Fair Chance Act where people who are coming home from incarceration will be able to get a job without being discriminated upon. Not one other community has been disassembled and harmed in the way the black community has been harmed by this dirty, stinking drug war. You wonder why a 14-year-old is out selling cocaine because his mother is working three jobs and still can't pay to rent because minimum wage is $7.45 an hour and his father is in jail on crack charges because every 28 grams of crack is a mandatory five years and it takes 500 grams of cocaine to get the same amount of time. But who's going to have crack? Black people. We represent a space of a certain level of clarity around all of the different permutations that enslavement has taken the form of. So first it was the actual physical chains of enslavement of being tied. And for me policing is the way in which white America continues to replicate the cycle of enslavement that reminds itself of the power relationship on which the society is based. Everything that happens to us is a precursor of what is in store for you. So if you don't understand that, then you don't understand that our fight for freedom is your fight for freedom because one of the burdens of oppressed people is to be the agent and the catalyst of the freedom of their oppressors.