(Right Now!) Sweeney Short Votes in the Senate for Marijuana Legalization

Insider NJ's Fred Snowflack gives an analysis of how Republicans in the NJ legislature responded to the NJ 2020 budget bill, which was passed by both houses and sent to Gov. Phil Murphy for review.

As of this moment in time, state Senate President Steve Sweeney (D-3) falls short of the necessary 21 votes he needs to pass legalization of adult marijuana, according to a Senate Democratic Caucus source.

The source told InsiderNJ that Sweeney right now has 17 solid votes in favor.

The following are the Democratic caucus no’s on legalization (but they’re not all hard no’s):

Senator Bob Andrzejczak (hard no)

Senator Jim Beach

Senator Fred Madden (hard no)

Senator Shirley Turner

Senator Ronald Rice (hard no)

Senator Dick Codey (hard no)

Senator Paul Sarlo

Senator Joe Lagana

Senator Brian P. Stack

There may be transactional opportunities with the ones who are not hard no’s, a second source said.

But it’s still tough, the source acknowledged.

Then there are these on the fence:

Senator Linda Greenstein

Senator Nellie Pou (in the Senate Judiciary Committee yesterday the Passaic County lawmaker said she had not yet decided on how she will vote on the floor).

Senator Bob Smith (the Piscataway-based Democratic senator yesterday voted legalization out of the Senate Judiciary Committee but said it would be one of the toughest floor votes of his long career).

Here’s another challenge for Sweeney: two Republicans who sometimes cross-the-aisle in support of the senate president (Senators Kip Bateman and Kristin Corrado) are (at this point anyway) no’s.

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One response to “(Right Now!) Sweeney Short Votes in the Senate for Marijuana Legalization”

  1. Sweeny by all accounts was footragging on this all along. Guess he misses the halcyon Christie days.

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