Virginians 21 and older who wish to access cannabis will have to continue growing their own or seek untested and unregulated products elsewhere after Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin vetoed legislation on March 24.
The legislation, passed by Democratic lawmakers who control both chambers of the state’s General Assembly, intended to establish a framework for licensed and regulated adult-use dispensaries to sell lab-tested cannabis in the commonwealth.
Under current law signed by former Gov. Ralph Northam, Virginians 21 and older have been able to home-cultivate up to four plants per household and possess up to 1 ounce of cannabis since July 2021, but they have nowhere to purchase it legally—leaving the Old Dominion in legalization limbo since.
Virginians 21 and older who wish to access cannabis will have to continue growing their own or seek untested and unregulated products elsewhere after Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin vetoed legislation on March 24.
The legislation, passed by Democratic lawmakers who control both chambers of the state’s General Assembly, intended to establish a framework for licensed and regulated adult-use dispensaries to sell lab-tested cannabis in the commonwealth.
Under current law signed by former Gov. Ralph Northam, Virginians 21 and older have been able to home-cultivate up to four plants per household and possess up to 1 ounce of cannabis since July 2021, but they have nowhere to purchase it legally—leaving the Old Dominion in legalization limbo since.
RELATED: Virginia Senate Passes Bill to Legalize Adult-Use Cannabis Sales
This marked the second straight year that Youngkin vetoed an adult-use cannabis sales bill passed by the Democratic-controlled Legislature, repeating the same concerns over health and safety.
“States following this path have seen adverse effects on children’s and adolescents’ health and safety, increased gang activity and violent crime, significant deterioration in mental health, decreased road safety, and significant costs associated with retail marijuana that far exceed tax revenue,” Youngkin said in his veto statement. “It also does not eliminate the illegal black-market sale of cannabis, nor guarantee product safety. Addressing the inconsistencies in enforcement and regulation in Virginia’s current laws does not justify expanding access to cannabis, following the failed paths of other states and endangering Virginians’ health and safety.”
Youngkin’s veto message was word-for-word the same as the one he issued in 2024.
The vetoed legislation, sponsored by Sen. Aaron Rouse, D-Virginia Beach, and Del. Paul Krizek, D-Fairfax, would have required licensed dispensaries to verify all customer ages, track all cannabis from seed to sale, and provide certificates of analysis to ensure products were tested for mold, pesticides, heavy metals and other contaminants that are often present in unregulated markets.
Among 916 bills sent to Youngkin’s desk during this legislative session, the cannabis legislation was one of the 157 bills that the governor rejected. He also vetoed bills that would have raised the state’s minimum wage and guaranteed paid sick leave for 3.4 million workers.
Although Virginia Democrats expected Youngkin to once again veto the cannabis sales bill, Krizek said earlier this year that he worked on passing the legislation to ensure his caucus didn’t give the governor a “free pass” on an “important” public policy issue. Youngkin’s veto comes at a time when 60% of Virginia voters support a commercial market for adult-use cannabis sales, according to a January 2023 survey conducted by Christopher Newport University pollsters.
"Once again, Governor Youngkin has prioritized his personal politics over public safety, opting to keep control of Virginia’s marijuana market squarely in the hands of unregulated operators," Virginia NORML Executive Director JM Pedini said in a public statement. "This common-sense legislation would have taken marijuana out of corner stores and smoke shops and legalized access only for those age 21 and older in licensed dispensaries. Instead, these vetoes put at risk the health and safety of adult consumers and children alike, and provide protections to no one but the illicit market that has ballooned during his time in office.”
In his veto message, Youngkin laid out his repeated concerns with cannabis legalization:
- Adverse Effects on Children’s Health and Safety;
- Failures of States With Legalized Retail Marijuana;
- Increase in Violent Crime, Psychiatric Disorders, and Decline in Safety; and
- Virginia's Current Cannabis System.
Many of the governor’s claims have been debunked outside the commonwealth. For example, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) found that high school cannabis use decreased 30% from 2021 to 2021 following adult-use sales launching in 11 states in the U.S., including Colorado, Washington, Oregon, Alaska, Nevada, California, Massachusetts, Michigan, Illinois, Maine and Arizona.
In Colorado, the nation’s first state to launch adult-use sales in January 2014, a government report on the impacts of legalization found that the percentages of Colorado high school students who reported ever using cannabis in their lifetime or in the past 30 days were lower than the national average five years after adult-use sales began. The data was gathered through the Healthy Kids Colorado Survey, which the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment began administering to high school students in 2005.
Youngkin referenced Colorado in his veto message, suggesting that cannabis legalization there caused a significant increase in fatal traffic accidents. However, this claim is unsubstantiated, according to the Colorado Division of Criminal Justice’s Office of Research and Statistics, which referenced a study of 4,946 drivers screened for cannabinoids in 2016 and 5,032 screened in 20218. The percentage of those drivers testing positive for cannabinoids decreased from 73.1% to 66.3%, with the median toxicity level of those drivers also decreasing.
The Virginia governor also claimed in his veto that “marijuana carries the same dangers as other drugs,” relating it to opioids, and that the “commonwealth recognized this when it created a medical marijuana system.”
Virginia’s medical market includes five vertically integrated licensees: AYR Wellness, Jushi Holdings, Green Thumb Industries, The Cannabist Co. and Verano, which operate 23 dispensaries in the commonwealth.
Green Thumb Chairman and CEO Ben Kovler targeted Youngkin’s veto on social media Tuesday morning, posting charts of rising opioid- and alcohol-related deaths in the U.S. from 2003 to 2023 alongside a blank chart showing zero cannabis-related deaths during that period.
“Mr. Governor, we are confused,” Kovler wrote on X. “If this is really about ‘health and safety,’ how do we explain these charts to our kids?”
Backing Kovler’s point, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) asserted in December 2024 that “no deaths from overdose of marijuana have been reported,” while the CDC reported that roughly 178,000 Americans die from excessive drinking each year.
Although cannabis industry advocates and stakeholders offered many of the same counterpoints following Youngkin’s identical veto message last year, the governor’s stance hasn’t changed.
“Attempting to rectify the error of decriminalizing marijuana by establishing a safe and regulated marketplace is an unachievable goal,” Youngkin said. “The more prudent approach would be to revisit the issue of discrepancies in enforcement, not compounding the risks and endangering Virginians’ health and safety with greater market availability.”
