What marijuana reclassification means for the United States

WASHINGTON (AP) – The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration is moving toward reclassifying marijuana as a less dangerous drug. The Justice Department’s proposal would recognize the medical uses of cannabis but wouldn’t legalize it for recreational use.

The proposal would move marijuana from “Schedule I” to the less tightly regulated “Schedule III.”

So what does this mean and what are its consequences?

What actually modified? What happens next?

Technically nothing yet. The proposal should be reviewed by the White House Office of Management and Budget after which subjected to public discussion and review by an administrative judge, a potentially lengthy process.

Still, the shift is taken into account a “paradigm shift and is very exciting,” Vince Sliwoski, a cannabis and psychedelics lawyer in Portland, Oregon, who runs outstanding legal blogs on these topics, told The Associated Press when the federal Health and Wellness Commission Department of Social Services advisable the change.

“I can’t emphasize enough how important this news is,” he said.

This got here after President Joe Biden last 12 months asked each HHS and the attorney general, which oversees the DEA, to review marijuana classification. Schedule Legally, I put it on par with heroin, LSD, quaalude, and ecstasy, amongst others.

Biden, a Democrat, supports legalizing medical marijuana for use “where appropriate, consistent with medical and scientific evidence,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Thursday. “That is why it is important that this independent review passes.”

If marijuana is reclassified, will it legalize recreational marijuana nationwide?

NO. Schedule III drugs – which include ketamine, anabolic steroids and a few combos of acetaminophen and codeine – are still controlled substances.

They are subject to varied laws that allow for certain medical uses and federal criminal prosecution of anyone who deals drugs and not using a license.

No changes are expected to medical marijuana programs currently licensed in 38 states or to legal recreational marijuana markets in 23 states, but they’re unlikely to satisfy federal requirements for production, recordkeeping, prescribing and other requirements for Scheduled drugs III.

There have not been many federal prosecutions for easy marijuana possession in recent times, even under marijuana’s current Schedule I status, but the reclassification would don’t have any direct impact on people already involved in the criminal justice system.

“Put simply, this move from Schedule I to Schedule III is not going to get people out of jail,” said David Culver, senior vp of public affairs at the U.S. Cannabis Board.

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However, the rescheduling itself would have some impact, particularly on research and marijuana taxes.

What would this mean for research?

Because marijuana is a Schedule I drug, it has been very difficult to conduct authorized clinical trials involving the administration of the drug. This has created something of a catch-22: requiring further research, but making it harder. (Researchers sometimes depend on people’s own reports of marijuana use.)

Schedule III drugs are easier to check, although changing the classification won’t immediately reverse all barriers to testing, Culver said.

What about taxes (and banking)?

Under the federal tax code, businesses that “trade” marijuana or another Schedule I or II drug cannot deduct rent, payroll, or various other expenses that other businesses can write off. (Yes, a minimum of some cannabis businesses, especially state-licensed ones, pay taxes to the federal government despite its marijuana prohibition). Industry groups say the tax rate often tops out at 70% or higher.

The deduction rule doesn’t apply to Schedule III drugs, so the proposed change would significantly reduce taxes on cannabis firms.

They say it might treat them like other industries and help them compete with illegal competitors that frustrate licensees and officials in places like New York.

“That’s how you strengthen these state legal programs,” says Adam Goers, director of medical and recreational marijuana giant Columbia Care. He co-leads a coalition of corporations and other players that’s pushing for the schedule change.

It could also mean more promotion and promoting of cannabis if those costs could possibly be deducted, based on Beau Kilmer, co-director of the RAND Drug Policy Center.

The rescheduling would don’t have any direct impact on one other marijuana business issue: difficulty accessing banks, particularly for loans, as federally regulated institutions fear the drug’s legal status. Instead, the industry sought a measure called the SAFE Banking Act. It passed the House multiple times but stalled in the Senate.

Are there critics? What are they saying?

They do exist, including the national anti-legalization group Smart Approaches to Marijuana. President Kevin Sabet, a former Obama administration drug policy official, said the HHS suggestion “contradicts science, reeks of politics” and is a regrettable nod to an industry “desperate for legitimacy.”

Some legalization advocates say the marijuana reschedule is just too gradual. They wish to deal with removing it completely from the list of controlled substances, which doesn’t include items like alcohol or tobacco (they’re regulated, but they usually are not the same).

Paul Armentano, deputy director of the National Marijuana Law Reform Organization, said simply reclassifying marijuana would “perpetuate the existing divide between state and federal marijuana policy.” Minority Cannabis Business Association President Kaliko Castille said she would only postpone the “rebranding ban,” relatively than giving full clarity to state licensees and definitively ending a long time of arrests that disproportionately attracted people of color.

“Schedule III will leave it in this amorphous, dirty middle where people won’t understand the danger that it will still be illegal at the federal level,” he said.