- The U.S. is signaling a pullback from marijuana liberalization, with Massachusetts weighing re-criminalization, Idaho restricting legalization authority, the Supreme Court declining a challenge to federal prohibition and Congress banning many THC products.
- Public skepticism about marijuana’s harms is growing even as use continues to rise, with more than 64 million Americans using it in 2024 and evidence suggesting parental use influences teen perceptions and behavior.
- President Donald Trump has revived a pledge to reclassify marijuana to ease federal restrictions, a move that could mark the most significant shift in federal cannabis policy in decades.
Since 2012, 24 U.S. states have passed amendments to legalize recreational marijuana. Massachusetts did it in 2016, and the Bay State is now the first state looking to re-ban the drug.
Supporters submitted 74,000 signatures in December to end its legal sale, set potency limits, regulate the medical marijuana program, and criminalize possession of more than one ounce. The population of Massachusetts is about 7 million.
To the west in Idaho, where marijuana is illegal in all forms, a ballot initiative could shift authority to legalize marijuana, narcotics and psychedelics solely to the state’s legislature.
On Monday, the Supreme Court declined to see a case challenging the constitutionality of the federal marijuana prohibition.
And in the federal continuing resolution, passed mid-November, law makers banned the sale of most THC-infused products, including drinks and snacks. Charles Fain Lehman wrote in City Journal about the new ban, “When the law takes effect next year, Americans will, for the first time since federal prohibition in 1937, have less access to pot than they used to.”
Has the public perception of marijuana changed?
In a recent interview with the Free Press, Kevin Sabet, the founder of the advocacy group Smart Approaches to Marijuana, said the legalization of marijuana has been “everything we predicted and worse.”
“In America, we tend to need to burn our hands off before we can be convinced that the stove is on,” he said. “Now, people are realizing that maybe it wasn’t the best idea to allow commercialized, unfettered 99% THC to be sold anywhere, to anyone.”
Though public perception on the effects of marijuana have grown worse over the past two years, its use-rate has consistently risen. In 2024, more than 64 million people in the U.S used it in some form, up from 28.6 million in 2009, per estimates.
Studies have found that children are much more likely to use marijuana if they believe their parents do. In Washington State in 2024, 32% of teens said they believed their dads used marijuana, and 25% said they believed the mothers did.
In 2023, Washington ranked 10th nationally, with 22% of adults reporting marijuana use at least once that year.
Will Trump reclassify marijuana as a less dangerous drug?
On Monday, President Donald Trump reiterated a 2024 presidential campaign promise to reclassify marijuana as a less dangerous drug, easing federal restrictions.
“A lot of people want to see it the reclassification, because it leads to tremendous amounts of research that can’t be done unless you reclassify, so we are looking at that very strongly,” he said from the Oval Office.
Trump’s comment came after reports from The Washington Post that the president held a private meeting last week to discuss a potential executive order with cannabis industry executives, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Medicare administrator Mehmet Oz.
If he signs an executive order classifying marijuana as a Schedule III drug, it would be “the biggest reform in federal cannabis policy since marijuana was made a Schedule I drug in the 1970s,” D.C. attorney Shane Pennington told the Post.