“Safe Access Now!” Shout Pro-Pot Protesters at Downtown Rally

An estimated 50 people showed up in front of the downtown Federal Courthouse on Wednesday, July 25, to protest the closing of medical marijuana dispensaries countywide.

The rally, held at noon, was directed against federal actions that don’t support Proposition 215 and SB420. Speakers noted that the will of California voters who voted for safe access was not being honored.

San Diego U.S. attorney Laura Duffy has succeeded in "closing down over two hundred dispensaries in the City of San Diego and now has set her sights on Mother Earth's Alternative Healing Cooperative," according to the Association for Safe Access (ASA) Facebook page announcing the protest rally.

Mother Earth is reportedly the only sheriff-permitted medical marijuana dispensary in the four most southern counties in California. The co-op received an eviction notice to cease operation by July 25  and lost their appeal to stay open.

Bob, a medical marijuana activist who uses a wheelchair, told me, “They were changing the locks today on the Mother Earth Co-op."

With bullhorn in hand, organizer Eugene Davidovich asked the group, dressed in green ASA T-shirts and waving signs at passersby, “What do we want?" The protesters answered: “Safe access!” Davidovich asked again: “When do we want it?" The answer: "NOW!”