Oregon Ends Its 3-Year Experiment With Legalizing Hard Drugs

Hard drugs are once again illegal in Oregon, as a new law ends a failed experiment in decriminalization. On Sept 1, the bipartisan House Bill 4002 reintroduced penalties for drug possession. “This ends the legalization of hard drugs which had prevented law enforcement from intervening, even when they were being consumed quite blatantly in public places,” Rep. Kevin Mannix, a Republican cosponsor of the bill, wrote in a Sept. 2 statement. The bill also toughened penalties for drug traffickers to prevent them from profiting from addiction, he said. Overdoses Soar The law reversed Ballot Measure 110, the Drug Addiction Treatment and Recovery Act, which voters narrowly approved in 2020 and was intended to address the state’s drug addiction problem....