A coalition of anti-marijuana, law enforcement and religious groups are imploring President Donald Trump to oppose a cannabis rescheduling proposal that he says his administration will decide on within weeks.
Led by Smart Approaches to Marijuana (SAM), the coalition sent a letter to the president on Monday, saying the organizations “strongly urge that you reject reclassifying marijuana as a Schedule III drug” under the Controlled Substances Act (CSA), a move that Trump had endorsed during last year’s campaign.
One signatory of the letter, the Drug Enforcement Association of Federal Narcotics Agents, represents personnel at the Drug Enforcement Administration, the agency that the cannabis reform proposal currently sits before.
“President Trump has an opportunity to make a stand for the safety of children across America by opposing the flawed proposal to reschedule marijuana,” SAM President Kevin Sabet said in a press release. “Marijuana has not been approved for any medical use by the FDA, nor has any raw plant. And it likely never will. It is an addictive drug with a high risk of abuse. That’s why it sat in Schedule I for decades and why it must stay there.”
Cannabis is currently classified as a Schedule I drug, but the Biden administration initiated a scientific review that led it to it to propose moving it to Schedule III. That wouldn’t federally legalize the plant, but it would allow state-licensed marijuana businesses to take federal tax deductions and remove certain barriers to research.
In the letter, the organizations acknowledged that the argument that marijuana shouldn’t be placed in the same schedule as heroin are “politically salient and easy to understand.” However, they said reform advocates “fundamentally misunderstand how drug scheduling works.”
“Contrary to popular belief, drug scheduling is not a harm index,” they said. “Rather, it balances the accepted medical use of a substance with its potential for abuse.”
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