A measure that would allow marijuana users to carry a concealed firearm didn’t garner enough signatures to head to the Colorado ballot this year, organizers said.
The deadline to collect 98,492 signatures this year is July 29, and organizers say they will fall short, The Durango Herald reported. But they said they hope to get the question on the November 2016 ballot and will launch another signature-gathering campaign next year.
“This time, we’re just going to have to call it what it is — we failed,” Edgar Antillon, one of the organizers behind the Colorado Campaign for Equal Gun Rights, told the newspaper.
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The campaign aims to change state law to prevent sheriffs from denying concealed carry permits because of marijuana use. Though the drug is legal in Colorado, the measure would put the state in conflict with federal guidelines to keep guns away from marijuana users.
Last year, Democratic Sen. John Walsh of Montana unsuccessfully tried to change that, suggesting that federal prosecutors be barred from pursuing medical marijuana patients who own firearms.
Colorado sheriffs who process concealed carry applications oppose the proposed ballot question, arguing that use of the drug remains illegal under federal law.
On the applications, people are asked 14 questions under oath, including whether they have a restraining order, have been convicted of a felony or have been treated for alcoholism within the past 10 years.
They also are asked if they are “an unlawful user of” marijuana “or any other controlled substance.”
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Information from: Durango Herald
