we'll soon know who will get the okay to open medical marijuana grow facilities and dispensaries in pennsylvania. they could pop up in your community. today, we'll discuss what that could mean. and "not holding back," a local professor calls alleged backchannel communications attempts between jared kushner and russia either treason or corruption. and a "growing danger," lurking behind the wheel, we'll discuss an nbc 10 investigation that finds more drugged drivers than local police believe they can catch. male announcer: nbc 10 "@issue" starts now. lauren: good morning, i'm lauren mayk for nbc 10 "@issue." the pennsylvania department of health says it will happen by the end of the month, permits for 12 medical marijuana grow facilities and 27 dispensaries. two grower licenses have been allocated for the part of the state that includes philadelphia and the surrounding counties.

so, what if a marijuana facility gets approved for your community? many residents in the area where permits are pending just aren't clear about how dispensaries, growers, and processors will be regulated. with me now to help us understand how the program will be rolled out in pennsylvania is william roark. roark is co-chair of the pennsylvania bar association's committee on medical marijuana and hemp law. he is also the chair of the medical marijuana practice with the law firm hamburg, rubin, mullin, maxwell & lupin. roark helps clients comply with pennsylvania medical marijuana laws. welcome, thanks so much for joining us. william roark: thank you for having me. lauren: now, you recently took a trip out of state to do some research about how this works. tell me what you found. william: sure, and i love the word "research." it encompasses all sorts of sins. i went out west for a trade show, and what i wanted to do was try to see what was in the cutting edge technologically

in states that have delved into this industry before pennsylvania. when i was out there, though, unexpectedly, i was presented with an opportunity to obtain a patient id card. i was simply meandering the halls of a trade show when a woman named roxy presented me with a clipboard and she asked me if i had any interest in finding out more about patients' rights. i said, "yes." i was presented with a form and i hadn't even been in the state for 20 hours, and i left that trade show with a patient id card. lauren: and is that something that you think you should qualify for? william: absolutely not, and i'm a advocate. i'm a believer that medical marijuana has a place in our society, that injured and sick patients ought to have all of their medical options in front of them. however, the process that i went through shouldn't be called "medical." i had a 40-second consultation with a doctor through an ipad

where i was asked 3 questions and then told to go live my life, and that was it. lauren: and so, how does the process there compare with what the process is here? is that danger here that folks could be getting ahold of these cards and getting access that they really just shouldn't be? william: no, and in fact, the pennsylvania legislature knew situations and experiences like that were happening out of state so they went out of their way to make sure that wouldn't happen here. pennsylvania's program is as robust of a regulation system that you're gonna see across the country. they want medical marijuana to be the emphasis here. so in pennsylvania, there is a defined list of medical conditions that a patient needs to have before he or she can be recommended medical marijuana from their doctor. the doctors who recommend the medical marijuana have to, they, themselves, apply to the department of health to be certified to recommend it.

they have to take a training course. and then they need to continue to treat that patient after they recommend the medical marijuana. so the situation that i had of chatting with a doctor on an ipad, meeting roxy, and leaving with a patient id card, that won't be happening in pennsylvania. lauren: you know, i think one of the questions that a lot of folks have, i've been out talking to people about what this is going to be like and they have questions about, "well, what happens if something pops up on the corner of my street or on main street where i take my kids? whether it's a grower or a dispensary, what's it gonna look like? and how's it going to be regulated, just in terms of what happens, literally, around that storefront?" william: sure, well, let's start with the dispensaries because, as your numbers showed, those are gonna be a lot more prevalent in this area. and important for your viewers to understand, you evidenced that there were gonna be 27 permits issued by the end of the month. each company that receives one of those permits has the lawful right to operate three locations.

so you have ten permits granted to philadelphia and the surrounding areas, but each of those permittees is gonna wanna open up multiple locations. so they're gonna be a lot more prevalent than the growing and processing facilities. it's important to know not only what the dispensary's gonna look like but what the patients coming to the dispensary is gonna look like, 'cause that's the foot traffic. and that's where the difference between what you see out west and here is really important because the patients coming to a pennsylvania dispensary would have already consulted with their own doctor about this, would have identified one of the medical conditions that has been permitted to treat for with marijuana, and would have applied to the department of health and been vetted by the state before they even show up. so if they were there for some nefarious purpose or if they were there to just simply get high, they wouldn't be coming to the dispensary. they would keep going to the means or the method that they're getting that now. so the people coming to the dispensary have voluntarily taken themselves out of the shadows.

the dispensaries themselves are gonna look a lot more like your rite aids and your cvs than they are a dispensary out west. lauren: will you have to go through any type of security in order to just get through the door, or could anyone walk in and talk to whoever might be workin' the counter? william: no, absolutely not. before you come in, you'll need to present a valid patient id card. lauren: before you even get in the door? william: there'll be a foyer, presumably. you know, they don't wanna be doing all of this outside. they wanna have somewhat of a welcoming atmosphere. so, someone will come in and there will be an analogous to a hostess stand at a restaurant. they'll take the card and importantly, they'll make sure not only are you allowed to be here, but have you waited long enough? because when you purchase your medical marijuana from a dispensary, they're not allowed to give you more than a 30-day dosage. so when you check in, they wanna make sure that you didn't just come here last week or you weren't at the store around the corner. so there is a real-time tracking inventory system that's in place to make sure that you're supposed to be there. lauren: and you know, we've been talking about the state regulations, but there is a gap between what's allowed

by the state and then what the federal laws say. so how is that gonna work? is it then gonna be legal for them to have it as far as the federal government is concerned? how does that work? william: sure, it's a fascinating legal discussion, but you have to preface it with marijuana remains a schedule i drug under the controlled substances act. but you can't end the discussion there. starting in 2014, the department of justice lost the funding to prosecute regulated medical marijuana organizations. it was originally written in by representative rohrabacher from california. and that was passed as part of the 2014 budget, 2015, 2016, and it's still there now. so, the department of justice doesn't have the money from congress to prosecute state-regulated medical marijuana organizations. they continued to do that throughout the years until-- lauren: what about individuals though?

i mean, if you get it, and then let's say you come in contact with a dea agent, are they going to be okay with you having it? william: well, i can't speak for the dea agent, but if that individual gets prosecuted at a federal level for holding marijuana and they are a state-permitted patient, i'd be happy to defend them and to talk them through the process and the rights that they have. the medical marijuana organizations, though, are protected now by a 9th circuit court of appeals decision. it's called the united states versus mcintosh. it was decided last year that said for congress, or for the department of justice to continue to prosecute medical marijuana organizations when they lost the funding to do so violates a little thing in the constitution called "the appropriations clause." and the 9th circuit threw that case out, and all of those individuals now have that protection. so, pennsylvania medical marijuana organizations, although they are still dealing with a controlled i substance, they know that at least they have that level of protection from the federal government. lauren: all right, will roark, thank you so much for

joining us and for walking us through what we can expect over the next couple of months. as the investigation into links between the trump administration and russia heats up, a local russian expert wonders, "who is really in charge in the white house?" that when we come right back.

lauren: fired fbi director james comey has been cleared to testify on capitol hill. now, as much as the white house wants to avoid talking about the russia investigation, the issues is unlikely to die down. instead, it's about to heat up. and with me now is mitchell orenstein. he is a professor of russian and east european studies at the university of pennsylvania. he's been following developments in the russian investigation very closely. thanks so much for being here. mitchell orenstein: thanks, lauren, it's great to be here with you. lauren: and let's start with the jared kushner situation. he is the son-in-law of the president, also an advisor to the president, and allegedly attempted to open a backchannel to russian officials.

you've got some concerns about that. tell me why. mitchell: yeah, absolutely, i mean, the question really is, why a backchannel? what did he need to say to the russians that he didn't want anyone in the us government to hear about? the problem is the context. essentially, we know that donald trump's campaign was supported by the russian government. it was supported with a lot of fake news. lauren: and supported, you don't mean they were giving money. you mean that they preferred him over hillary clinton. mitchell: well, i think they were giving support. so they were giving material support insofar as they were providing bots that were promoting his agenda. they were promoting his campaign. they were providing news stories that the president himself, in some cases, picked up and tweeted out. lauren: but just to be clear, there has been collusion proven between donald trump's campaign and the russians. mitchell: i think that's absolutely wrong. i think that-- lauren: you think that it has proven at this point? mitchell: absolutely, absolutely, i mean,

i think it's very clear. donald trump himself said in july of 2016 that he would like the russians to hack the democratic emails and to release hillary clinton's emails, which they then did. now, we don't know exactly if it was secret collusion, right, if there was anything, you know, going on behind the scenes that we don't know about, but we certainly do know that, in many ways, the russians were actually materially supporting the campaign and that there was at least some kind of public, you know, sort of tacit coordination between people in the trump campaign and the russians. and i think that's really clear. lauren: well, and i just wanna be clear because i know that that is your view, but james comey, the former fbi director, has said that the fbi was investigating whether there was collusion, but that at this point, we do not have any proof that that's true. i know that that is your view, but we do not have any proof of that at this point. mitchell: there's a question of what do you mean by "proof," right? obviously, proof that will stand up in a court of law, right,

is one thing, right? but if you take the president's statements of, "i would like you to release emails," and then the emails get released, you could say that's sort of circumstantial, i suppose, in a court of law, but it's not nothing. it's a real evidence of collusion. there's also the fact that there were emails and news stories that were sent by the kremlin out into the social media in support of trump or attacking hillary clinton that the white house itself or that the trump campaign picked up itself and then promoted. and there was clearly, you know, moments in the campaign where there was kind of coordination going on. whether it was planned or not, i agree, we don't totally know whether that's the case. the real question, it seems to me, is whether there was a kind of quid pro quo. in other words, in exchange for russian support for the trump campaign, did trump promise anything to them? and i think that's the real question that we don't know anything about. lauren: and i wanna ask you a little bit more about the backchannel situation that we were talking about with jared

kushner because there also have been other instances where future presidents were setting up a channel to talk to another government, and there are also people who say there really was nothing wrong with that, the department of homeland security secretary is one of them. so, what's wrong with that? mitchell: well, i think a question is, you know, what was the context going on, right? so, here you have a situation where the russians are supporting the trump campaign, right? and then you have the son-in-law, i guess, of the president, you know, trying to set up a backchannel to talk to the russians that he didn't want anyone in the us government to know about. so what was he talking about? and the question people are raising is still this fundamental question, "was there a quid pro quo?" were there things that the trump campaign was promising to the russians in exchange for its support? and were those the things that were being discussed in this backchannel? lauren: what are the things that the russian government would want? mitchell: well, it's really interesting.

again, one of the really interesting features of all this is how much came out publicly, right, how much was said publicly. i just mentioned donald trump's statement that, "we want cooperation from the russians," right, that was said on national tv. everybody heard it in july. lauren: well, he said during the campaign that he wanted the us to have a better relationship with russia. mitchell: he specifically said in july that he wanted them to leak her emails, okay? and he said that on national tv. now, the thing on the other side, putin was also very open with what he wanted back from trump. he said in a statement in october 2016, right in the heart of the campaign, that what he wanted was the us to drop sanctions. the united states imposed sanctions against russia in exchange for the--when russia invaded crimea, when russia invaded eastern ukraine, and again when they hacked the election. there were three sets of sanctions that the united states government placed on russia. and vladimir putin's key demand was to drop those sanctions.

and so the question, we know that flynn, for instance, was discussing with kislyak on the very day that the obama administration was putting in place the third type of sanctions against the hacking. and so, people naturally are wondering, "was that because flynn was trying to promise to the russians that he was gonna remove those sanctions and that they shouldn't overreact and shouldn't be worried about it." lauren: and let's talk a little bit about sort of what this means to the rest of us. you know, we can talk about whether or not jared kushner did anything wrong. we can talk about whether or not the president anything wrong, whether it was any contacts he had, with jim comey talking about russia investigation, or whatever. but why does it matter to the rest of us, or does it? mitchell: i mean, the key reason it matters is who's calling the shots in washington? the question is like sally yates' question for flynn, could he be blackmailed? this same question-- lauren: could who be blackmailed?

mitchell: could michael flynn be being blackmailed by lying, you know, publicly and doing things that he knew that the russians knew about, right? you know, that put him in a position to be compromised. and the question that we really--the fundamental question is, is trump being blackmailed by the russians because of things that he promised to do and you know, wasn't able to do for them? and because of the help that they provided him that gave them compromising material, kompromat, over him that now means that vladimir putin is calling the shots on us foreign policy, not the president of the united states. lauren: that's a pretty strong statement. and then, there was no evidence that there is any blackmail going on. mitchell: i think there is a lot of circumstantial evidence that there's blackmail. in fact, many of the conservative commentators that i follow, like max boot or david frum, who are from the conservative side of the spectrum, or people on the democratic side of the spectrum, really believe that this sanctions issue is something that putin wanted that trump

may have promised to deliver on. that's a piece we don't necessarily know. and now the russians are kinda demanding, "look, you didn't do this," right? and now they're starting to sort of lash out a bit at him. for instance, in the meeting that he had in the white house with kislyak, and with foreign minister lavrov, he appeared to be sort of trying to report back to them and saying, "look, i fired comey. now that takes the pressure off the russia investigation." lauren: we're just about out of time. mitchell orenstein, thank you so much for joining us. mitchell: all right, thank you very much. lauren: the white house had not denied reports that jared kushner sought to set up secret channels of communication with russian officials. his lawyers say he is willing to talk to investigators about his foreign contacts and his work with the trump campaign. there is no indication kushner is currently a target of the fbi's probe, and there are no allegations he has committed any wrongdoing. next on nbc 10 "@issue," drivers putting lives on the road at risk. they're not distracted or drunk, they're drugged.

we'll tell you why it's a struggle for local police to stop them.

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tiger woods: oh, no. male: are you sure? tiger: yes. male: a hundred percent? tiger: a hundred percent. lauren: this dashcam video shows the traffic stop that led to tiger woods' dui arrest. over 35 minutes, you see the famous golfer fail test after test after test and then finally end up in handcuffs. a breathalyzer test found wood's alcohol level was at 0%. the golfer says, "alcohol was not involved." he said, "what happened was an unexpected reaction to prescribed medications." woods' arrest has brought new attention to driving under the influence of drugs. recent research finds that drugged driving is on the rise. both prescription and illicit drugs are part of the problem. and as nbc 10 investigative reporter mitch blacher found out, local police are struggling to stop it. mitch blacher: kenton iwaniec's fifth day as a pennsylvania state policeman was his last.

debra iwaniec: my biggest regret is that i didn't make it there in enough time. mitch: he didn't die on the job, but driving home from it. debra: no one deserves to die that way. no one deserves to suffer at the hands of a drunk or drugged driver. mitch: the driver who hit and killed him was going 73 in a 45-mile-per-hour zone. she had oxycodone and vodka in her system. debra: she crosses the center line, hits our son head on. he never saw her. mitch: according to penndot, more than 8,000 drivers have been killed or injured since 2010 by a drugged driver. twelve thousand more have been hurt or killed by someone on both drugs and alcohol. corporal scott davis: this suspect is impaired and this is why they're impaired. mitch: pennsylvania state police corporal scott davis is trying to bring the numbers down. we met him training philly and upper darby police on how to catch drugged drivers. scott: those numbers are a lot higher than what they actually are showin' on paper mitch: the corporal says that is because most police are not trained to detect drugged drivers. here in pennsylvania, they are just 174 of what are called

"drug recognition experts." mitch: these officers work specifically to test suspected drugged drivers, but it isn't easy. with alcohol, they can use a breathalyzer. but when drugs are suspected, there needs to be a blood test. that means more time and more money. scott: we don't test 'em for the drugs because it costs, you know, money for those tests. it's a blood test. it takes more time. mitch: and you already got 'em. scott: we already got 'em. lieutenant andrew reuben: and you don't know how many lives you may have saved because you took this guy off the street. mitch: in delaware, newark police lieutenant andrew reuben is 1 of 23 drug recognition experts in the state. both lieutenant reuben and corporal davis train police in their states but say they can't keep up. they've caught people driving on legally prescribed painkillers and illegal stimulants like cocaine. both say the most common drug they find now is marijuana. andrew: we've had an increase, i think, in the number of multiple offenders. scott: it is frustrating. i mean, i'm a human being.

i'm strongly passionate about what i do. mitch: if not for a drugged driver, trooper kenton iwaniec might be working alongside these officers. since he died, his mother has become a fierce advocate to get police more help. debra: everything kenton was or would have been was taken in an instant because someone else chose to drive impaired. mitch: for the investigators, i'm mitch blacher, nbc 10 news. lauren: health officials say many people don't realize that over-the-counter drugs can cause drowsiness or impaired driving. they warn it's important to follow the product label very carefully before getting behind the wheel.

itmiss hoffman gets usle to mathere safe every time. mrs. migliaccio teaches us all about fractions - and haikus - and the erie canal! miss reeves makes us sound amazing. and miss santoro always takes time to see how we're doing. miss simpkins keeps our school looking great. recess wouldn't be recess without miss basile. and mrs. mccarthy always has tons of good books to read.

which makes for a pretty good day at school. ♪ lauren: that's it for this edition of nbc 10 "@issue." don't forget to follow us on twitter. just search @nbc10@issue. let us know what issues you'd like to know more about. have a great sunday. ♪

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nbc sports, home of the olympic games, the fedexcup playoffs. the nhl. the nascar playoffs. and super bowl lii only on nbc. welcome to paris and venus williams at the very top playing a crucial point, trying to stay in this round of 16, singles match. a month shy of her 37th birthday. already the oldest woman in the history of the open here in tennis to get to the round of 16 at roland garros. this has not been her best major. can she write another improbable story