Since 2012, 19 states, Washington, D.C., and Guam have legalized marijuana for recreational use — something 55% of Texans have said they either support or strongly support, according to a new Dallas Morning News-University of Texas at Tyler poll.
And the numbers are even higher for medical use: 72% of those surveyed said they would either support or strongly support the legalization of marijuana in Texas to help treat illnesses, a move the Texas Legislature helped bolster last year when it expanded the state’s medical marijuana program to include all forms of post-traumatic stress disorder and cancer.
Though marijuana remains illegal under federal law, Rhode Island became the 19th state to fully legalize the drug in May, and more states, including Missouri and South Dakota, will vote on whether to legalize recreational use this November.
Many efforts at the state level reflect growing popular support for legalization and decriminalization among voters, but some legislators and governors, especially in red states, remain hesitant.
After a May survey with similar results, Gov. Greg Abbott said his position on marijuana legalization has not changed beyond what he’s proposed in the past — reducing the criminal penalty for marijuana possession to a Class C misdemeanor, but not legalizing the drug.
Possession of up to 2 ounces is currently a Class B misdemeanor in Texas, punishable by up to 180 days in jail and a fine of up to $2,000. Possession of more than 2 ounces could result in up to a year in jail, and more than 4 ounces is a felony.
The Morning News-UT-Tyler poll shows a division on legalization among party lines as well: 38% of Democrats surveyed said they strongly support, and 27% said they support, legalization of the drug for recreational use, while 26% and 17%, respectively, of Republicans said they do.
Laurie Richardson, a Democrat in Frisco who responded to the Morning News-UT-Tyler poll, said while she’s never smoked marijuana herself, she knows it has some medical benefits, and when it comes to recreational use, “prohibition doesn’t work,” she said.
“We tried to prohibit alcohol, and then you have all these people trying to create their own alcohol and people getting alcohol poisoning — I feel the same way with marijuana,” Richardson said. “I just don’t think you’re gonna be able to stop people from accessing it if they want it. I think it needs to be treated almost like alcohol.”
According to the poll, 12% of Democrats and 32% of Republicans said they strongly oppose legalization for recreational use.
“If they legalized it, you’re gonna have a dispensary pop up on every corner in our town, and that’s not really something that I look forward to seeing every day,” said Republican Edwin Kirby, who lives in Tyler and responded to the Morning News-UT-Tyler poll. “With the drug problems we have now with young kids, that’s just gonna add fuel to the fire.”
For medical use, those numbers are a bit more uniform: 49% of Democrats and 35% of Republicans said they strongly support medical legalization, and 8% of Democrats and 13% of Republicans said they strongly oppose it.
“I’ve got a son that was in the Marine Corps, and he uses it for medicinal purposes,” said Paula Miller, a Republican in Diboll, outside Lufkin, who responded to the Morning News-UT-Tyler poll. “If anything, they need to make alcohol illegal,” she said after sharing that one of her family members died in an accident caused by a drunk driver.
Of the political affiliations surveyed, independents appeared the most supportive of legalization: 51% of those surveyed said they strongly support legalization for medical use, and 42% said they strongly support legalization for recreational use.
Texas is among the 19 states that have enacted medical marijuana programs, with the Legislature approving the creation of a compassionate use program in 2015.
Eligible residents have been able to access low tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) cannabis through the program, which is limited to Texans with epilepsy, seizure disorders, multiple sclerosis, spasticity, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, autism, incurable neurodegenerative diseases, and now all forms of PTSD and cancer.
Methodology
The Dallas Morning News/UT-Tyler Poll is a statewide random sample of 1,384 registered voters conducted Aug. 1 and 7. The mixed-mode sample includes 412 registered voters surveyed over the phone by the University of Texas at Tyler with support from ReconMR and 400 registered voters randomly selected from Dynata’s panel of online respondents. The margin of error for a sample of 972 registered voters in Texas is +/- 2.6 percentage points, and the more conservative margin of sampling error that includes design effects from this poll is +/- 2.8 percentage points for a 95% confidence interval.
The online and phone surveys were conducted in English and Spanish. Using information from the 2020 Current Population Survey and Office of the Texas Secretary of State. The sample’s gender, age, race/ethnicity, education, metropolitan density and vote choice were matched to the population of registered voters in Texas.
Visit the Center for Opinion Research for more information about our current and previous studies.
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