When, on Dec. 18, 2025, President Donald Trump directed his attorney general, Pam Bondi, to "take all necessary steps to complete the rulemaking process related to rescheduling marijuana to Schedule III of the Controlled Substances Act in the most expeditious manner," several U.S. listed cannabis stocks jumped, according to BNN Bloomberg. Bloomberg called Trump's move "the biggest shift in marijuana regulation since 1970," referring to the year when President Richard Nixon signed the Controlled Substances Act, “provisionally” placing marijuana on Schedule I the following year – a “temporary” drug classification that has remained in place for more than 55 years.
Bloomberg was not alone in its characterization. Trump’s Executive Order 14370 (his 224th executive order in his second term) has been widely interpreted by financial news sources as a cataclysmic “sea change” of federal policy in support of marijuana reform. Reuters called it "the biggest policy shift," while Forbes echoed Bloomberg, referring to the executive order as "the greatest change to U.S. drug laws” since 1970.
However, these characterizations and superlatives are not justified. A close review of what the Trump administration is actively doing (and intentionally not doing) shows instead that, despite the words of the executive order, the current presidential administration is engaged in a concerted reversal and backtracking of President Joe Biden’s pro-rescheduling of cannabis initiatives.
Executive Orders Issued by a President Do Not Change the Law
The U.S. Constitution does not specifically give the president the power to issue “executive orders.” Instead, Article II, Section 1, Clause 1 of the Constitution states that “executive power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America.” (The “vesting” clause.) Additionally, Section 3 of the same article states that the president “shall take care that the laws be faithfully executed.” (The “take care” clause.) These clauses have been interpreted by the courts to permit the president a vehicle/voice to ensure that federal law or policy is implemented (executed) properly.
According to the American Constitution Society, examples of executive orders or proclamations have been used by presidents “to signal priorities and direct their administrations.” Examples (for good or for bad) have included the Emancipation Proclamation (President Abraham Lincoln’s 1863 Emancipation Proclamation regarding the enslaved in the states of rebellion during the Civil War), the desegregation of the U.S. military, the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II, and President Gerald Ford’s pardon of Nixon.
Through such executive orders, a president can “sign-post,” that is, generally explain how the administration plans to interpret and enforce the laws passed by Congress.
But as the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1952, a “president’s power ... to issue [an executive] order must stem either from an act of Congress or from the Constitution itself.” (Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer, 343 U.S. 579, 585 (1952).) “Executive orders ... cannot override federal laws (legislation) or contradict case law interpreting those laws.”
That said, federal legislation (the Controlled Substances Act) does “vest” the U.S. attorney general with authority to “schedule, reschedule or decontrol drugs.”
Trump’s Rescheduling III Order Is Groundhog Day of Biden's Incomplete Schedule III Attempt – With Several Big Differences
Marijuana’s federal legal status remains unchanged. To those who do not dig too deep into agency actions, where we are now seems on the surface to be a repeat of Biden’s unsuccessful two-plus-year rescheduling effort (from October 2022 to January 2025).
That effort included Biden signing into law in December 2022 the Medical Marijuana and Cannabidiol Research Expansion Act, which upped the number of federally approved medical marijuana research publications, such as cannabis and lung health.
Biden also publicly and unequivocally expressed support for marijuana reform in October 2022, when he filmed a pro-reform public service announcement (PSA) at the White House, which got traction on YouTube. Biden explained that his push for a different federal take on marijuana was because its criminalization has resulted in disproportionate arrests, prosecutions and convictions of many people of color.
Also in October 2022, Biden exonerated thousands of Americans federally convicted of marijuana possession with widespread pardons. Biden also directed federal prosecutors to reduce possession prosecutions, calling for great caution and seeking supervisory approval if federal prosecutors sought to charge marijuana possession offenses.
Then, 14 months later, in December 2023, Biden issued more marijuana possession pardons for collateral type offenses, like attempted possession and marijuana infractions on federal land.
Biden, on Oct. 6, 2022, directed then-Attorney General Merrick Garland to review marijuana’s outdated Schedule I (no accepted medical use) classification, which Garland did in a 92-page proposed rulemaking issued on May 16, 2024. This followed Biden’s Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Xavier Becerra’s Aug. 29, 2023, own scheduling recommendation to reclassify marijuana as a Schedule III drug.
Click HERE to view an immersive version (with live links) of President Biden's 2022-2025 Pro-Marijuana Reform Timeline as seen below.
But the rescheduling momentum stalled after the November 2024 election.
Two weeks before Trump was set to be sworn into office on Jan. 20, 2025, new evidence emerged that the DEA provided preferential treatment to anti-rescheduling parties, with a pro-rescheduling party arguing that the DEA used “its authority in these proceedings to subvert the process and thwart the Schedule III proposal, which it vehemently opposes.”
The DEA’s reluctance to reschedule is the likely reason the agency decided to have more anti-marijuana groups testify at the merits hearing, which the DEA administrative law judge canceled on Jan. 13, 2025, a week before Trump’s second inauguration.
So, other than Trump’s Dec. 18, 2025, executive order, nothing is happening to further rescheduling.
Marijuana remains a Schedule I drug. Simple possession of marijuana for personal use remains on the books and is a federal crime under 21 U.S.C. Section 844. Possession with intent to distribute, depending on the quantity, remains a federal felony subject to steep, mandatory no-parole-minimum sentences per 21 U.S.C. Section 841 (a).
Also, transporting marijuana across state lines is still a federal crime even when state-legalized regimes have contiguous borders (think California, Oregon and Washington) under 21 U.S.C. Section 952.
How can this be so? Because the U.S. Constitution provides that the federal government controls “interstate commerce,” and the U.S. Supreme Court, since the 2005 case of Gonzales v. Raich, has authorized the federal government through its commerce control powers to federally criminalize state-legal marijuana usage, cultivation and commerce.
While Trump’s December 2025 executive order makes it appear that the administration supports rescheduling, the actions of his administration’s agencies tell a different story.
Trump’s 2025 DOJ Rescinds Biden’s No-Charging Marijuana Possession Guidance
On Sept. 29, 2025, in an internal email to Justice employees (and not publicly available on any federal “.gov” website), the Trump DOJ rescinded Biden’s policy of no prosecution for marijuana possession offenses. While Biden supported federal amnesty for personal marijuana users, the Trump administration does not.
While Biden took to YouTube to explain that marijuana possession arrests and prosecutions disproportionately impact Black users (with, on average, a Black person being 3.6 times more likely to be arrested for marijuana possession than a white person, despite similar use rates), Trump has been mum on this point.
But it is more than that. U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi, formerly Florida’s state attorney general, was against marijuana legalization when the state’s medical marijuana legalization initiative was being considered, calling the 2014 measure “misleading.”
While Trump, when out of office, in August 2024, took to his social media platform and said he supported Florida’s subsequently unsuccessful adult recreation initiative, as president, this week, he took a 180-degree turn with respect to D.C.’s efforts to legalize. On Feb. 4, 2026, Trump signed into law government funding legislation that definitively prevents the federal District of Columbia (D.C.) from legalizing marijuana.
Trump’s 2026 anti-legalization for D.C., coming now at the beginning of the second year of the second Trump administration, is not inconsistent with Bondi’s anti-marijuana possession policies. She has not just reversed Biden’s marijuana possession amnesty (Biden’s Oct. 6, 2022, Marijuana Pardon Proclamation 10467 and Biden’s Dec. 22, 2023, Marijuana Pardon Expansion Proclamation 10688), but she has also directed that charges be brought for personal marijuana use and possession.
Under the 2025 Trump-DOJ anti-marijuana policy, marijuana users will face “rigorous” prosecution with the use of “every prosecutorial tool to hold offenders accountable.” The new policy was unveiled just as the 40-day federal government shutdown of 2025 had concluded.
On Nov. 13, 2025, Wyoming's U.S. Attorney Darin Smith announced the Trump administration’s new “tough on possession” policy. Smith explained that this administration thinks that marijuana use is a public safety hazard and “the detrimental effects of drugs on our society are undeniable.”
Characterizing marijuana possession as a public safety hazard is a way to cover up or ignore the well-documented racial implications in marijuana possession arrests and prosecutions. Addressing racial injustice is no longer a federal priority. In fact, the administration views such efforts disparagingly, with references to U.S. historic sites as America’s history of slavery now being removed.
With this as a backdrop, it should come as no surprise that federal marijuana possession arrests are up, and these include federal prosecution of $25 marijuana purchases. In September 2025, Reuters reported that DOJ agents from the DEA and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) have been "doing foot patrols alongside local police officers, searching for everyday violations." The same news source reported that DEA agents had gone undercover to buy $25 of marijuana and two individuals were charged (in D.C.’s federal court) with possession.
Trump’s December 2025 Schedule III Rescheduling Order Is Window Dressing for Doing Nothing
While Trump received accolades in the financial press for his December 2025 Schedule III recommendation, the president’s DOJ, including the DEA, is not on board. Neither arm of the administration is taking steps to reschedule; their anti-marijuana views are apparent in their pro-prosecution directives for marijuana possession.
DEA Administrator Terry Cole still has not committed to rescheduling marijuana. Cole, confirmed by the Senate in a 50-47 vote on July 22, 2025, at his hearing, agreed to review the “process of rescheduling.” To date, Cole has not agreed that marijuana should be rescheduled.
Cole has the power at his fingertips to further rescheduling – now. The DEA has had no administrative judges on its staff since August 2025. These administrative judges are the ones who administratively oversee drug reclassifications. Cole controls the selection of the DEA’s administrative judges. Cole could appoint a new judge to lift the January 2025 stay of rescheduling that the now-retired administrative DEA judge Mulrooney put in place.
Lifting the stay could restart the administrative public rescheduling hearings at the DEA headquarters in Arlington. They had been scheduled to be held from January to March 2025.
The DEA could reinvite or invite anew some of the 43,000 people who commented on rescheduling during the Biden administration. The DEA could also overcome the allegations of anti-rescheduling bias by broadening those it invites to testify at any restarted rescheduling hearing. Cole has such authority under the Administrative Procedure Act (APA). Nothing prevents Cole from taking these steps.
Cole, too, could overtly acknowledge the innovation of the regulated state-legal cannabis businesses in the United States. With 24 states with adult-use and medical systems, and another 15 states with robust medical-only programs (see Werner-Simon marijuana legalization map below*), legal marijuana is a big economic driver in the U.S. economy.
[*Note re Legalization Map: Although Texas, on June 20, 2025, expanded its severely-limited access program, from permitting only 1% THC by weight to increasing that to 10 milligrams per dosage, since no package can exceed 1 gram of THC, Texas' toe-tip into medical acceptance is not considered by the authors to be robust enough to constitute full-fledged medical legalization.]
According to the financial database Statista, revenue from the U.S. regulated legal cannabis market was $45.35 billion in 2025.
Cole could decide to chuck the Schedule III recommendation and start the rulemaking process over with a lower schedule. The current administration could justify new rulemaking because, as far back as Nixon’s 1972 Shafer Commission findings, marijuana has been shown to have low to little potential for abuse.
Cole could assert that cannabis has an even lower potential for abuse than Schedule III drugs like ketamine and testosterone, and that it would be better placed lower on the schedule or even in the lowest classification category, that is, Schedule V, which includes anti-diarrhea medication. (See CSA classification schedule chart below).
Given marijuana’s special status as not just a “state-legal” medicine but also as a product of state-permissible adult recreational use (like alcohol), the DEA could create a whole new category for marijuana. It could get behind the creation of a new Schedule VI, which would mean marijuana could be used without a doctor’s prescription. The group, Schedule 6 Framework, supports this special status for cannabis, advocating that it be placed in an entirely new schedule permitting the kind of sale and use allowed across legalized regimes in the states and U.S. territories.
Although the Biden administration’s proposed rulemaking was to reschedule cannabis, Cole could abide by the views of a significant majority of the 43,000 comments already lodged in the existing rulemaking process. According to the Drug Policy Alliance (DPA)’s analysis, some 69% supported descheduling cannabis entirely by removing it from the CSA altogether.
Under the APA, if the regular rulemaking process is followed and the proposed marijuana rescheduling classification is changed, Cole would comply with public notice and comment requirements and also hold hearings at the DEA’s administrative court on rescheduling.
Plus, if the administration really wished to move marijuana from Schedule I to any other schedule, according to Chicago attorney Alissa Jubelirer, the administration (through the U.S. attorney general) could skip the APA public comment period requirement and reschedule marijuana following international treaty requirements, as the U.S. is a participant in the United Nations’ Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs. This could mean issuing an order to reschedule marijuana to fulfill treaty obligations, bypassing the public comment period.
But none of this has happened. Trump’s December 2025 Schedule III executive order has resulted in no action so far. The support of marijuana reform from the administration is in words only. Frankly, the current attorney general (Bondi) has been occupied elsewhere and, in the eyes of some, has failed to do her part to even address the fentanyl crisis: Bondi, in July 2025, missed a legal deadline to issue Fentanyl Research Guidelines required by the Halt Fentanyl Act.
The administration’s actions (pursuing possession offenses) and doing none of the above to change cannabis’ federal legal status speak louder than the words of an executive order.
With Nothing Happening, We Are Back in the Time of Nixon
With the Trump administration doing nothing at best, and backtracking at worst, with its push to nab possession offenders, we find ourselves back in the 1970s with the criminalization of marijuana by the federal authorities as a result of Nixon's signature drug legislation, the Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act of 1970, the Controlled Substances Act (CSA).
It was Nixon's antipathy to marijuana and marijuana users of his day (to include some anti-Vietnam War "hippie" protesters) that led to the criminalization of marijuana. And while Nixon appointed the Shafer commission to study marijuana’s efficacy and addictiveness, Nixon overruled the commission, which found that marijuana was not a gateway drug to hard drugs and was not addictive. Instead, Nixon insisted that marijuana be “temporarily” classified as a Schedule I illegal drug, alongside heroin and LSD. It is still that way today.
Will Congress Finally Legalize Marijuana by Amending or Modifying the CSA?
With the Trump administration’s inactivity to reschedule or reform marijuana laws (as it could do with its power as the nation’s executive, per Article II of the U.S. Constitution), there is always Congress, which could use its legislative powers to change the law (Article I, U.S. Constitution). Congress created the CSA of 1970, and it could change or modify that existing law.
While just last month Congress dropped language from a funding bill that would have barred the administration from rescheduling marijuana, Congress has not changed the CSA to legalize marijuana.
Starting in December 2014 with the Rohrabacher–Farr federal budget provision, all Congress has done, to date, is pass funding or federal government appropriations with a slight carve-out to prohibit the use of federal budget funds to prevent states from implementing their own laws authorizing the use, distribution, possession, or cultivation of medical marijuana.
The medically compliant congressional budget rider (initially sponsored by California Republican Rep. Dana Rohrabacher and Democrat Rep. Sam Farr) has prohibited the federal government, specifically the DOJ, from using federal budget funds to investigate and prosecute those in medically legal states who fully comply with their state laws.
Versions of the provision have been included in federal annual budget bills since then.
Rohrabacher–Farr (under a variety of names) has been regularly incorporated into the federal Commerce Science and Justice (CSJ) budgets, as well as related agencies' appropriations acts. It is CSJ that funds the DOJ, DEA and other federal agencies, which explicitly bans spending funds to interfere with the implementation of state medical cannabis laws.
The carve-out against investigation and prosecution of those in medically legal states was first considered by the U.S. Court of Appeals in the Ninth Circuit in United States v. McIntosh, 833 F.3d 1163 (9th Cir. 2016). As a result of that case, people charged with marijuana offenses who have complied with the rules of their legal state have made McIntosh motions successfully challenging the federal government’s ability to use federal funds in such prosecutions. (Sandusky v. Goetz, 944 F.3d 1240 (10th Cir. 2019)).
But without federal congressional action in the form of legalization by legislation, the Supreme Court case, Gonzales v. Raich, 545 U.S. 1 (2005), is still the law of the land. The U.S. Supreme Court, in that case, ruled that Congress’ criminalization of marijuana under the CSA was constitutional under Congress’ power to control “commerce.” So, even if the states have legalized marijuana, the feds, since 1970, have maintained the authority to criminalize.
This means that until Congress changes the CSA and/or the Trump administration actually changes marijuana’s schedule, marijuana remains federally illegal.
According to Judith Cassel, a partner at HMS Legal in Pennsylvania, an administrative and commercial law expert who represents grower-processors, distributors, and dispensaries (among others), “rescheduling of marijuana is not imminent.” Cassel cautions clients that “this is not a time where we can look to prior drug rescheduling actions or take a federal government statement at face value. We are, where we have been, still in a years-long effort to change marijuana’s federal status.”
Congress created this situation in 1970 by “temporarily” placing marijuana in Schedule I. As our country celebrates its 250th birthday in July 2026, consider that marijuana has been federally illegal for one-fifth of our nation’s history.
It is certainly time for a change, but don’t hold your breath.
