No, it’s not (just) a cruel play on words. Last week, the Drug Enforcement Administration announced that a much-anticipated public hearing on the proposal to reschedule marijuana was being pushed from early December until the first quarter of 2025. I’m not sure I specifically predicted this, but it’s just about the most predictable thing ever. And it has a number of people thinking (wrongly in my opinion) that rescheduling may not even happen given the results of the recent elections.
Our friends at Marijuana Moment did a nice job laying out the facts:
After DEA Administrator Anne Millgram signed off on over two dozen witnesses to participate in the hearing on Monday, Chief Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) John Mulrooney issued a preliminary order on Thursday signaling that the information provided on those set to testify was insufficient and requesting additional details and potential availability for a formal hearing in January or February 2025.
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The reason being is that DEA’s list of hearing participants who were selected and sent to the ALJ’s office provided “no indication in the four corners of the document as to whether the ‘participants’ support or oppose the [notice of proposed rulemaking] or how the ‘participants’ satisfy the ‘interested person’ definition set forth in the regulations,” the judge’s order says.
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The order from the DEA ALJ says that selected participants must provide such details by November 12. DEA is mandated to provide “its counsel(s) of record who will be appearing in these proceedings, as well as any known conflicts of interest that may require disclosure” on the same date.
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This comes about seven months after the Justice Department formally proposed moving cannabis from Schedule I to Schedule III of the Controlled Substances Act (CSA) following a scientific review. After a public comment period, which saw tens of thousands of people weigh in on the issue, a hearing was set for December 2 to gather additional expert input.
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DEA has already made clear that it feels additional information is needed on a number of topics related to the scientific review into marijuana that led to the reclassification recommendation. Some view the scheduling of the hearing as more evidence of DEA skepticism.
Look, rescheduling marijuana was never going to be quick or come without hiccups and even setbacks. Paul Armentano, deputy director for NORML, said that “it’s always been a possibility that this process could drag out longer than many either anticipated or would like… The administrative process is cumbersome and, as we have seen historically, administrative challenges to marijuana’s Schedule I status take years to resolve,” he told Marijuana Moment.
A huge, unanswered, and probably unknowable question is whether the results of the elections last week will derail what appeared to be a fait accomplice just months ago. Anyone who tells you with absolute certainty what Donald Trump and the political appointees he tasks to run the DOJ, DEA, and FDA are going to do when it comes to federal cannabis policy is not a serious person.
Trump has expressed support for an adult-use marijuana regime in his home state of Florida (a ballot initiative that ultimately received just under the 60% threshold to become law), and we have previously written about how, during his first term, Trump was largely “cannabis ambivalent.”
It is perhaps understandable, though, to wonder if maybe a Republican administration may not move with the same sense of urgency during the rescheduling process. Or, a frightening thought for industry advocates, Trump could appoint a cannabis hardliner that affirmatively seeks to stop rescheduling. That would certainly lead to litigation that could last years.
Given the seemingly bipartisan popular support for rescheduling, the fact that the train is already starting down the tracks, and the fact that I believe Trump is unlikely to devote political capital to stopping rescheduling, I continue to believe that rescheduling is on the horizon, even if that horizon is a little further away than some may wish.
H/T: natlawreview.com
