I’m sure this will gain him a lot of help in the next election.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton is suing five cities — Austin, San Marcos, Killeen, Elgin and Denton — to block their ordinances decriminalizing low-level marijuana possession.
In 2022, voters in the five cities approved policies that would end arrests and citations for possession of less than four ounces of marijuana. An initiative spearheaded by Ground Game Texas — the progressive group that first launched the proposition in Austin — worked with local organizations in the other four cities and succeeded in pushing for similar policies to appear on the ballots.
Paxton said in a Wednesday press release that the cities violated state laws and the Texas constitution concerning marijuana possession and distribution, claiming it to be unlawful for municipalities to adopt ordinances inconsistent with laws enacted by the Texas Legislature.
IANAL, but I’m not sure that’s how laws in nested jurisdictions like the US work. If a city doesn’t want to spend resources to enforce state law, or if a state doesn’t want to spend resources to enforce a federal law, who’s gonna make 'em? Obviously constitutional restrictions exist for all US governments, but you can’t like, coerce a sub-jurisdiction to do anything beyond that, can you? That’s why ten states rejected the ACA and were able to legally do so.