Former House Speaker John Boehner, who has been making the media rounds to criticize Republicans while promoting his memoir “On The House,” could net $20 million through promoting his pro-marijuana and anti-GOP agenda, Daniel Greenfield, a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the Freedom Center, writes in a column.
“The media doesn’t want to puncture the spectacle of the sleazy sad sack doing a tour for a book no one wants and taking the same old cheap shots at President Trump and Republicans by asking him how much money was at stake for him in Biden’s win,” Greenfield writes for Frontpage Mag. “How much money is at stake if Republicans lose again in 2022 and Democrats hold onto control of the government?”
Boehner, after leaving office, had long opposed drugs while still a lawmaker, but now is on the board of Acreage Holdings, one of the largest marijuana operations in the United States. He also heads the National Cannabis Roundtable, which lobbies for drug legislation.
But, Greenfield reports, Acreage was facing serious losses in 2020, even with moves to legalize marijuana, and the company lost $286 million that year alone.
However, Canopy Growth, a Canadian company that is controlled by the liquor giant Constellation Brands, has made a deal to buy out Acerage if U.S. lawmakers federally legalize marijuana, but the only way for that to happen was if a Democrat won the White House, said Greenfield, citing Investor Place.
But Biden has promised to legalize marijuana and Vice President Kamala Harris, when she was still a senator, introduced a Democrat-favored bill that would legalize marijuana on a federal level, but her legislation needed a Democrat-controlled Congress to pass.
“Acreage and its investors needed President Trump and Republicans to lose across the board, and they need to retain control of the House and Senate long enough to legalize marijuana,” writes Greenfield.
And that would mean big bucks to Boehner, who could collect $1.5 million in cash once shareholders approve Canopy Growth’s acquisition of Acerage Holdings, he said, quoting Bloomberg News.
Further, Bloomberg noted that Boehner, at the time of the article in 2019, had 625,000 shares of Acerage and reported that if marijuana was made federally legal, he could get Canopy shares valued at around $16 million.
Boehner, a founding board member of the National Institute for Cannabis Investors, has also been seen on video telling investors that the money is about to come because the marijuana ban is almost over.
“If Boehner’s financial situation hasn’t changed significantly, there are millions at stake,” said Greenfield. “Defeating Republicans in 2020 and 2022 would be in his financial interest.”
Meanwhile, he added that Boehner, with his many TV appearances, is trying to rebuild his reputation as that of a “principled legislator decrying the fanatical excesses of House conservatives. Boehner has no principles.”
President Joe Biden “loves Boehner,” he added, and that’s why “Boehner loves him back.”
Meanwhile, the same media that falsely called Boehner a racist for years is now “happy to nod along” while he uses the same talking points from former Ohio Gov. John Kasich, ex-California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, and “the rest of the RINO gang,” Greenfield said.
“A decade ago the media was smearing Boehner as a radical bigot who was obstructing Obama. Now, Boehner is happy to smear Republicans as radical bigots who are obstructing Biden,” he said.