The marijuana industry is pouring millions of dollars into a lobbying campaign to push President Donald Trump into reclassifying marijuana as a harmless substance. It would be a grievous error for him to do so, worsening the opioid epidemic and weakening communities that Trump swore to protect from special interests.
The president told people who attended a recent $1 million-a-plate fundraising event that he was considering moving marijuana from Schedule I, the highest level of restriction under the Controlled Substances Act, to Schedule III, a lower classification used for things such as ketamine and codeine. The lower classification would mean easier and wider marijuana use and more financing for the already multibillion-dollar marijuana industry. One of those at the fundraiser was Kim Rivers, CEO of Truleive, one of the largest marijuana companies in the nation.
Trump has signaled weakness on marijuana before. He said he would vote for the marijuana legalization ballot referendum in Florida last fall. Trulieve and other big marijuana firms spent millions of dollars on television ads supporting legalization and on lobbying the president personally. He is reportedly interested in the issue because it is broadly popular with voters, including many Republicans. The Florida decriminalization measure got more than 50% support and barely missed getting the 60% it needed to pass.
Although reclassifying marijuana could give Trump a small temporary boost among some libertarians and drug users, it would be a disaster for the nation in the long term.
Marijuana is not harmless, as marijuana companies and their ally George Soros try to make it seem. The Soros-funded Drug Policy Alliance has spent millions of dollars legalizing marijuana in 11 states and Washington, D.C., and the results have been consistently appalling.
Because of marijuana commercialization, youth cannabis use has increased by 245% in the last 20 years. Marijuana is far more addictive than Soros and the marijuana companies claim, especially now that it is three times stronger than it used to be. Increased marijuana use has been linked to schizophrenia and permanent brain damage, particularly in the frontal cortex. Marijuana use and abuse have grown wherever it has been legalized.
The National Bureau of Economic Research has found that marijuana legalization is associated with higher rates of opioid deaths. “We’re becoming a drug-infested nation,” Trump said in 2017. “Drugs are becoming cheaper than candy bars.” He is right. Drugs are deeply damaging our nation and its people. “We will not rest until we have ended the drug addiction crisis,” Trump promised in 2023. Moving marijuana from Schedule I to Schedule III would be a step backward in combating the crisis of America’s drug infestation.
Trump has recently become committed to ridding Washington, D.C., of crime. So instead of making it easier to buy and smoke marijuana, Trump should make it harder. The constant, pervasive, and unpleasant smell of marijuana — it’s sometimes referred to as “skunk” — plagues all of Washington, D.C. Trump has the power to end that. There is no reason the federal enclave created by the Constitution to host the nation’s federal capital should smell like a drug den, and every reason it shouldn’t.
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“All policy and legal requirements and implications are being considered,” White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson said when questioned about Trump’s thinking on marijuana. The only interest guiding the president’s policy decisions is what is in the best interest of the American people.”
We hope that is true. If it is true, the only decision Trump can properly make is to keep marijuana in its current classification.