Smart Approaches to Marijuana re Trump maybe possibly loosening cannabis laws, “Based on the science, it never should have seen the light of day. To protect American public health and follow the science, President Trump should reject it.” | Cannabis Law Report | How to buy Skittles Moonrock online

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President Donald Trump announced Monday that a decision on easing federal restrictions around marijuana will be coming “over the next few weeks.”

The issue has been lighting up the news since Friday, with stories in The Wall Street Journal and CNN; a co-ordinated campaign of MAGA influencers has been trying to sway the administration.

But as the president faces this pivotal choice, he must remember that loosening those federal rules is a Biden administration policy proposal. Based on the science, it never should have seen the light of day. To protect American public health and follow the science, President Trump should reject it.

Some important context: Under the Controlled Substances Act, drugs are placed in a five-part schedule according to whether they have an accepted medical use and how high their risk of abuse is.

Drugs with no accepted medical use and a high risk of abuse are placed in Schedule I. That’s where marijuana currently is, and rightly so.

There’s no medical use for the drug itself (though two individual cannabinoids are used in FDA-approved medicines) and all the evidence we have shows marijuana is a significant abuse risk with government data outlining a 30% rate of addiction.

But under President Biden, the Health and Human Services Department in 2023 issued a recommendation that marijuana be moved from Schedule I to Schedule III. Sadly, the Biden HHS had to put politics before science in order to justify this recommendation, which departed from years of precedent.

For example, consider its claim that marijuana already has a currently accepted medical use treatment. HHS argued in part that because certain states allow doctors to recommend this dangerous drug, this constitutes accepted medical use. Yet we don’t decide medicine approvals or drug safety by votes and the efforts of political action committees. The laws allowing marijuana recommendations are not based on science, but on politics.

Look at Pennsylvania, where in 2022, 17 doctors issued more than 132,000 medical marijuana certifications, almost one-third of the state’s total that year.

Does that seem medically or scientifically sound?

The Biden administration also asserted that credible evidence supports such medical use in the case of marijuana.

Wrong again.

Consider the most frequent medical condition “treated” with marijuana, chronic pain: Evidence suggests the drug not only fails to mitigate pain, but results in lower pain thresholds. A major new systematic review from the British Medical Journal in June found a double risk of cardiovascular death associated with the drug.

Another, from Sorbonne researchers in May, found that weed use drives up suicidality, psychosis, and heart disease among teenagers by 85%.

The science never supported the Biden move. It was all about what some in the administration perceived as progressive politics and scoring an easy win in the face of domestic issues dragging the president’s approval numbers down. But marijuana is losing popularity as more communities are left to deal with the impacts of legalization.

President Trump has defined himself in opposition to his predecessor on every aspect of policy. What sense would it make for him, intent as he is on leaving his own clear legacy as commander in chief, to ratify this risky and unscientific one?

The president has also promised to make life better for everyday Americans.

Giving an effective green light to a drug linked to depression and suicidality, psychosis, and heart disease is the opposite of that.

All the more so since moving weed to Schedule III would allow marijuana businesses to take normal deductions on their taxes, including for advertising expenses.

That would supercharge their revenues and reach and do yet more harm.

This isn’t a partisan issue (or shouldn’t be). Marijuana presents serious concerns for public health.

Biden’s HHS was wrong to recommend rescheduling; the Trump administration would be making a costly mistake if it follows that path.

Such a move would also betray the promise inherent in the president’s recent, important executive order on open-air drug use, public disorder, and harm reduction: A move based on evidence and compassion both for substance abusers and communities across America.

Some ideas are best left in the past because they imperil our future.

President Trump must recognize that this is one of them.

_____

Luke Niforatos is the executive vice president for Smart Approaches to Marijuana, which primarily focuses on advocating against marijuana legalization.

https://dailycaller.com/2025/08/12/trump-schedule-i-ii-iii-one-drug-marijuana-cannabis-weed-federal-restrictions-op-ed/?utm_source=policy-decoded.beehiiv.com&utm_medium=dailybrief&utm_campaign=policy-decoded