Poll: 60% of Likely California Voters Support Initiative Effort To Legalize Marijuana

A majority of likely California voters say that they intend to vote ‘yes’ this November for an initiative to regulate the retail production and sale of marijuana by adults, according to the results of a Probolsky Research poll released late last week.

Sixty percent of respondents say that they will vote in favor of an initiative this November “that would legalize marijuana for recreational use under California law and allow government to tax” its retail sales. Thirty-seven percent said that they would vote ‘no.’

Support was strongest among those between the ages of 18 to 34 (80 percent) and self-identified Democrats (69 percent). Republicans (38 percent) and those over the age of 65 (46 percent) were least likely to express support.

The Adult Use of Marijuana Act (AUMA), which is expected to appear on the November ballot, permits adults to legally grow (up to six plants) and possess personal use quantities of cannabis (up to one ounce of flower and/or up to eight grams of concentrate) while also licensing commercial cannabis production and retail sales. The measure prohibits localities from taking actions to infringe upon adults’ ability to possession and cultivate cannabis for non-commercial purposes. Both the California Medical Association and the state chapter of the NAACP have endorsed the measure.

On February 20, a majority of the NORML Board of Directors endorsed the AUMA, along with separate initiatives that are anticipated to appear on the November 2016 ballot in Maine, Massachusetts, Nevada, and Arizona, as well as medical use initiatives expected to appear on the ballot in Missouri and Florida.