"We must learn from our mistakes."
"It is time to turn the page and to create a new drug policy for America, including offering alternatives to incarceration."
"What I am taking away is maybe there is one thing that everybody across the dais here can agree on, and that is that addiction is a disease. It is a deadly disease."
"Somehow, we have criticized science and compassion in favor of trauma and punishment."
"We know that punishment does not work."
"We have to start telling the truth, and that is that racism underlines many of the policy decisions that we put forth."
"This is a public health crisis. Too often drug offenses are borne out of poverty."
"We have 40 years to show that we have not addressed that demand, and it is time to try something else instead of continuing the same failed policies."
"If the Federal Government takes leadership, we will see more responsible policy at the State level."
"I lived through a malicious marijuana war that saw Black people arrested for possession at three times the rate of their White counterparts."
"This punitive approach creates more pain, increases substance use, and leaves millions of people to live in shame and isolation."