Massachusetts voters will decide November 3 whether to dismantle the state’s regulated adult-use marijuana market nearly eight years after legal sales began. Question 8, officially titled “Prohibit Retail Sale of Adult Recreational Use Marijuana,” would repeal the laws that legalize, regulate and tax recreational marijuana sales while leaving the state’s medical marijuana program in place. …
Category: Opinion
Opinion and commentary on cannabis policy, legalization, industry trends, reform efforts and major developments shaping the future of marijuana laws.
Flock Cameras Are the New Front in the War on Drugs, and Cannabis Reformers Must Fight Them
For decades, the war on drugs relied on traffic stops, confidential informants, aggressive searches and the selective enforcement of laws that disproportionately harmed poor and minority communities. Today, that machinery is being modernized. Flock Safety cameras and other automated license plate readers are creating a vast surveillance network capable of recording where millions of Americans …
Op-Ed: The Hemp Ban that is not a Ban, but a Reunification
By Anthony Deininger, Law Student Assuming the ongoing rescheduling process is complete and moves all remaining marijuana to Schedule III before November 12, then most naturally derived products that lose their hemp status would be reunited with marijuana instead of being “banned.” (@Anthonys_Takes on X) The 2018 farm bill defined “hemp” as the plant Cannabis …
Cannabis Banking Needs a Law, Not More Guidance
By Terry Mendez, CEO of Safe Harbor Financial When I read the American Bankers Association’s July 1 letter to Congress, I saw the country’s largest banking trade group making the same argument cannabis operators have been making for a decade: cash-only businesses are a public safety problem and it’s the surrounding communities that carry that …
Massachusetts Marijuana Repeal Is Likely to Fail, but the Cannabis Community Cannot Get Complacent
By Ashley Mitchell, Law Student and Medical Cannabis Dispensary Manager Massachusetts voters will officially decide this November whether to dismantle much of the adult-use marijuana system they approved a decade ago. Based on current polling, the repeal measure appears more likely to fail than pass. A February Bay State Poll conducted by the University of …
Cannabis Law Reform Is a Civil Rights Issue
By NORML In recent decades, there has been immense progress toward making cannabis available for both medicinal and recreational use. Generally speaking, Democrats in Congress are much more supportive of cannabis law reform than Republicans. However, even Democrat proponents seldom highlight the longstanding racial disparities that exist in the enforcement of cannabis prohibition. One of the …
Science is Winning the War on Drugs. What Does it Mean?
By Anthony Deininger, Law Student Well, what does that mean to you? Because there is little left that anyone can say. Just a whole lot left for us to heal from. As I sit here writing to you, I cannot help but think of the only truly pure soul that I have ever met. She is …
Cannabis Banking and Major Exchange Listings Don’t Need a New Law. They Need Updated Guidance.
By Anthony Deininger, Law Student The cannabis industry has spent years waiting for Congress to solve what is, at least in substantial part, an administrative problem. The Secure and Fair Enforcement Regulation Banking Act (SAFER Banking Act) has been treated as necessary for access to institutional banking, exchange listings, and the financial infrastructure that other …
The Congressional Cannabis Caucus Has Stalled Out. It’s Time to Start Over.
The Congressional Cannabis Caucus was supposed to be a driving force for reform on Capitol Hill. Instead, it has become a symbol of stagnation. That may sound harsh, but at some point honesty is more useful than politeness. If a caucus exists to keep marijuana reform front and center in Congress, then it needs to …
President Trump’s Marijuana Record Is More Pro-Legalization Than the Media Admits
By Ashley Mitchell, Law Student and Dispensary Manager For years, and especially in recent weeks, much of the media has treated Donald Trump as if he is instinctively hostile to marijuana legalization. That framing is lazy, incomplete, and increasingly hard to defend.
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