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Jason Rojas: “People were consuming cannabis prior to legalization.”

Featuring: Jason Rojas, Democratic | Connecticut House of Representatives, 9th Assembly District

Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike

Published February 13, 2026 | Video Starts at 21:43

And of course, they shouldn't be doing that. Right. That's not something we all wanted. But, you know, I always remind people People were consuming cannabis prior to legalization. Right. I think the real societal benefit right now is that people who want to engage in using cannabis can go buy it safely and buy it legally. (21:43–21:47)

CLAIM

Asserts cannabis consumption occurred before legalization.

This is an excerpt from a raw transcript. The assertions have not been audited or verified. Tap the video to view the source footage and understand the context.

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Jason Rojas

“50% of Hartford's grant list is non taxable because of the presence of state government, because of the presence of colleges and hospitals.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 13:01-13:08
“In the last year we collected $38 million in revenue all in.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 28:44-28:50
“For two of those recessions, our current rainy day fund would hold, but 2 to 3 billion dollars of that rainy day fund would be gone…”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 35:44-35:54
“There was a lot that we did in 8002 and there's a lot to follow up on.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 03:07-03:12
“The governor has proposed allowing [tenant unions], basically allowing the definition of an excessive rent to be more than 5% when bought by…”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 04:00-04:10
“Revisiting ADUs, accessory dwelling units is another way to get more housing.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 04:13-04:18
“The tiny homes is somewhat of a separate issue than an adu, although kind of similar in concept.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 05:12-05:16
“Whenever you give towns, municipalities the ability to do something on their own, they're generally going to make it more restrictive than…”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 06:09-06:17
“We didn't take local control away the way some people assert.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 06:59-07:04
“We didn't undermine local authority. All those decisions are going to continue to be made at the local level.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 07:03-07:09
“Governor Lamont was very clear he would want the towns and cities to set their goals, to zone where they want housing to be.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 07:12-07:18
“A lot of local officials are really beginning to realize they do need housing and they need more affordable housing.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 07:30-07:36
“It's a national issue. Right, Right. But in for Connecticut, given our land costs, given how small we are, it's that more salient of an…”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 08:01-08:12
“We're at the end of a seven year phase in of a dramatic increase in ECS funding.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 10:54-10:59
“We do have a constitutional spending cap. We have limitations to how much we can spend.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 11:08-11:13
“The formula is kind of complicated, but we know it begins with the foundation amount and that foundation amount essentially reflects what…”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 11:34-11:44
“We do provide a reimbursement to communities, right? But it's not 100% reimbursement. It's more like a 60% reimbursement for what they would…”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 13:10-13:20
“That billion dollars does get consumed by a lot of our fixed costs. Fixed costs being personnel, debt service, Medicaid, other types of…”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 13:38-13:47
“Every year it seems to be $300 million, maybe it's $300 million.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 14:09-14:14
“Do we need [average taxpayers] to understand exactly how the ECS formula works? Probably not.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 14:42-14:47
“We continue to see people going to Massachusetts... to purchase their cannabis.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 16:14-16:19
“We had a provision... which basically based a tax on the amount of THC in a product.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 16:35-16:46
“We were actually seeing... effective rates like 26 and 27%, which is really making it cost prohibitive for the consumer.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 16:54-17:01
“Our goal was really 20% [tax rate].”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 17:05-17:08
“We required... to have just very white packaging, like couldn't have any colors on it, couldn't have any marketing on it.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 17:22-17:30
“We don't want young people consuming these things, or... being attracted to a product that isn't intended for them.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 17:37-17:46
“We haven't quite got there yet on that point [equity in cannabis industry].”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 17:58-18:02
“We have 110 years of experience with alcohol.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 18:01-18:05
“I think it's more. Less dangerous than alcohol to be consumed by an individual.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 19:28-19:33
“There's no breathalyzer in the way that we have for alcohol.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 20:07-20:11
“We did include in the bill that we would train drug recognition experts.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 20:39-20:44
“I haven't seen data or any reporting on whether they're having issues in the court process with having charges of driving under the…”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 21:13-21:23
“People who want to engage in using cannabis can go buy it safely and buy it legally.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 21:49-21:55
“We don't want people smoking cannabis [while driving].”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 23:13-23:18
“None of us who supported legalization want to see any harm come from this.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 23:30-23:34
“It's not what I thought it was going to be either. Right. I mean, I think when we were having the debate, there was all these incredible…”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 23:41-23:54
“There are 80 plus dispensaries now. There are seven or eight cultivators.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 24:53-24:58
“If you want to build a cultivation facility, you're talking about $30 million.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 26:17-26:21
“We did create a fund to try to do this [support cannabis industry entry].”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 27:57-28:01
“The Social Equity Equity Council was charged with [overseeing the social equity fund].”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 28:22-28:25
“The governor has proposed a couple of rebates. Right. I think he's not actually proposing tax reductions.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 29:31-29:37
“We have cut taxes over the last two cycles.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 29:37-29:40
“The governor made, it was to fund $4.5 million for some programs throughout the state of Connecticut that were just cut mid year.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 30:47-30:55
“Maintaining a robust rainy day fund is a really smart thing to do.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 31:08-31:12
“They threw out a $500 million tax cut, but, you know, they always put the tax cut side of it out, but never show the other side of the…”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 31:20-31:27
“We cannot continue to rely on fossil fuels for our energy.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 32:47-32:51
“We can't wholesale change to clean energy either because that's not realistic.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 32:52-32:57
“When Wall Street's doing well, Connecticut's doing well. When Wall Street's not doing so well, we see our revenue impacted.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 34:39-34:46
“OFA did a stress test where they looked at the dot com recession, the 09 recession, and then kind of used their own numbers to create a…”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 35:34-35:43
“We have $4 billion, but half of it, 3/4 of it could be gone in a moment's time.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 35:54-36:00
“We haven't had the normal cyclical kind of downturn in our economy that historically we've had for a very long time.”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 36:11-36:18
“We avoid massive tax increases and we avoid draconian cuts, which is something I don't think the average resident of the Connecticut wants…”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 36:34-36:39
“There is a committee in which the four leaders, the senate president, senate majority leader, speaker, House majority leader, and the two…”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 37:56-38:10
“I'd like to see more investment in freight rail. Right. If there's one way to address traffic, it's to get more freight traffic off our…”
Rep. Jason Rojas talks housing and cannabis | Face More Facts with Mike & Mike | Uploaded February 13, 2026 | 41:39-41:49