SAFE Banking Act Lingers

SAFER Banking Act and cannabis. I wanted to pull that thread a little bit on how a prosecutor supports and is vocal about cannabis in Congress. How did you get to that place?

You know, when I first got here, it was one of those things where I’ve always been a states’ rights guy. I was listening to, at that point, [former Democratic Congressman from California] Sam Farr give a talk about how it was medically legal in California, yet the VA hospitals couldn’t prescribe it to veterans who were there, and veterans obviously were needing it for PTSD and other things. So I voted for it. And at that time, Speaker Boehner summoned me into his office saying, you know, “what the hell are you doing?” And I said, “Well, here’s why I think it’s a states’ rights issue….”

I watched my dad die of cancer, and all the poor guy wanted was to have a decent meal. And if that would have helped him at all, then why shouldn’t he have access to it? It’s stupid.

And I continue to get involved in those things because the states continue to move down the path between medically legal or fully legal. You can see where this is an industry that’s being created from nothing. And so, I’d rather make sure that we put the proper guardrails around it. And we did it correctly instead of having 50 different systems out there with no federal oversight other than to say don’t. And we have obviously created those same type of safeguards for the wholesale liquor industry and for beer and wine and spirits.

So I think it was important that we continue to do something and provide those safeguard rails, make sure kids don’t get it. Make sure what’s out there in industry is actually a safe product and not laced with fentanyl or other things and put some controls and reins in this growing industry.

And that’s how I got into the banking aspect of it as well. And the banking aspect brings in the Operation Choke Point where this government was then choking off people who dealt in firearms and people were getting debanked. I know [people] used to think that was an improper term. But I tell you the guy right now who really understands debanking is President Trump because it happened to him.

Do you expect that it will be introduced next Congress, both in the House and Senate? Because this was the time that the Senate Banking Committee reported the bill out of committee. There was that movement on the Senate side which we hadn’t had before.

We passed it seven times.

In the House.

I have had a number of meetings. And today I just had a going-away lunch with Patrick McHenry [R-N.C.], who was no big fan of it at the start, but he was crediting my being involved to the other members of the lunch. He put me in [Senate Democratic Leader Chuck] Schumer’s [N.Y.] office. Now he and [Former Arizona Senator] Kirsten Sinema schooled me on how this all works. I got him in to talk about SAFE and we spent the next half-hour talking about stablecoins. But that’s OK. Whatever it takes to make things work around here. If we have to hang on to stablecoins or whatever else.

These are all legitimate concerns, legal in the states in which they’re operating, and they should have access to a legal, safe banking system. And so banks can do what they do, they take that money and turn it around in the communities in which they exist.

We saw it as an opportunity in the insurance industry, making sure that we were able to get language that financial services included insurance so that those employers are able to offer benefits and get their workers required workers comp insurance without issue. Never thought I would be registered to lobby on cannabis, but here we are.

I never thought I’d be advocating for it.

But we’ll just try again next time.

You make a good point, too. I mean, the insurance industry has to insure these operations. When I get members to make the turn is if they actually go visit a grow operation and realize there’s people treating it like the product it is and it’s clean, it’s safe. It’s make sure that everything is taken care of and documented and they can follow this thing from seed to sale, that they know how much they produce.

And as government, I can only speak to [Ohio] because that’s the only one I really know, but that seed to sale, you know how much they produce, you know how much you could sell it for. So therefore having them in the banking system provides access to another avenue in which we can do oversight and internal control by showing, you know, if you grew 400 pounds, then you should have X number of dollars in the bank account. And if you don’t, then [that’s] reason for an audit. Similar to what we do [with] casinos.

We saw a lot, I think this past Congress and maybe even before that, just kind of the death of bipartisanship, where sometimes it was used as a campaign attack. Do you think we face that next Congress? Do you think it’s even stronger? Do you think there’s still hope?

Well, that’s a good point. I like to think there’s hope. But then again, I’m a Browns fan, so it’s rough. I think we’re going to get the Super Bowl sometime in my life.

But look, the people in RG2 [the Republican Governance Group], we went from D plus 12, which is David Valadao [R-Calif.], the new chair, to R plus 22, Blake Moore [R-Utah], who’s the secretary of the conference. And in between is a huge gap of folks, and we meet as just members, no staff or anything else, have lunch, and talk about the issues that are before us.

And then we also had the people from the White House transition team talking about some of the policies they want to get up and running in the first hundred days. And I think it’s important; you have to socialize the things that you want to get accomplished so people feel comfortable with them and start discussing those. And they feel like they’re part of the plan instead of being told what they’re going to do.

I think it’s more important if you do bills on a bipartisan basis, especially when we do it…with the tax bills, those are things that last. All the people you represent, those businesses, one thing they want from us is certainty. They want to know if they have a deduction this year, that they’re going to get something on a five- or 10-year window, that it’s going to be in place for the five- or 10-year window so they can get their investments back.

You see that now with a lot of the green energy. People didn’t necessarily want to do it, but the credits were out there and now all of a sudden you want to yank those credits back. That’s not fair to people three years into a five- or seven-year project and they’re not going to get those things. So that’s why I think we all get together and actually produce the will of the House. We produce much better bills that have more certainty, that give businesses more certainty, and certainly your industry as well.

We always end with two questions. Who’s a member from across the aisle that you work well with? Who’s one of your favorite Democrat members?

Well, since you brought up the cannabis issue, it took a long time, but [former Democratic Congressman from Oregon] Earl Blumenauer and I have developed a good friendship and rapport. He’s moving on. But I think that at first you get people here who really want to own an issue and he owned it. I was like the new kid at the candy store. So he wouldn’t want to let me in, but he finally understood that I don’t care if my name’s on anything. I just want to fix problems.

You don’t see me on TV because I don’t want to be there. I just want to do the right thing for the right reasons at the right time. And so we eventually got a really nice relationship. At his going-away party, I was the only Republican he invited to come up and speak on his behalf.

And what’s the No. 1 concern you hear from constituents when you’re back in the district?

The economy. I mean, people are worried. The inflation. It was best described to me by a village worker. It was right after [Former House Speaker Kevin] McCarthy got dumped and Patrick sent us all home for a cooling off because things were a little heated. And I was out walking the dog in the park and the gentleman shuts off the lawnmower and says, “Congressman?” “No, my name’s Dave.” “So, Dave, can I ask you a question?” I said, “Sure.” “What the hell’s going on?” “I wish I knew, brother. I mean, this doesn’t make any sense to me. Kevin McCarthy was a great guy, great speaker. Things were moving under him, and we had a consistency to our program. I don’t know what’s going on.”

And he says, “All I know is I’m working harder and I’m making more. And the village was kind enough to give me a 3% raise, but everything in my life is 20% more. You know, I bought a diesel truck, and I pay more than regular gas now for it. Everything, whether it’s my cable bill, whether it’s my utilities, whether it’s going out to get a new car loan, everything costs more.” And you hear that consistently throughout the district that people were finally really understanding that. Out in the farm country you could stop at some local farm and pick up a dozen eggs for, you know, two or three dollars. Well, all of a sudden, they were five. You know, everything went up. Even Amish areas went up.

It’s something that universally cut across for people, and they’re worried about their jobs, and they’re worried about their kids’ jobs and their grandkids’ jobs. Another part that this young man said to me is, look, I don’t care if the guy said mean things, I did better off under him. And so I think that might have been part of the allure for bringing President Trump back, was that while they don’t necessarily like some of the craziness that took place before, they’re willing to put up with some of the things as long as the economy is working in their favor instead of against them.