Cannabis arrests in Northwest Indiana counties that border Michigan and Illinois – both of which have legalized cannabis for adult use – fell between 2021 and 2025, NWI Times reports. In Lake, Porter, and La Porte counties, arrests for misdemeanor and felony cannabis charges totaled 1,272 in the first quarter of 2021 but were 734 by the fourth quarter of 2025. 

Cannabis arrests in the counties spiked to 1,742 during the second quarter of 2022 – the highest recorded during the time period – but dropped below 1,000 the following quarter, the analysis found. Arrests increased the following two quarters again, before falling below 1,000 again in the subsequent two quarters. In the fourth quarter of 2023, arrests fell to 666, but rose to 742 in the first quarter of 2024, before falling to 670 in the following quarter. 

The third quarter of 2024 saw the lowest levels of cannabis arrests across the three counties during the analysis period, at 468. The following three quarters saw three straight increases – to 734, 826, and 1,192, before decreasing again to 842 and then again to 734.   

Illinois permitted the sale of adult-use cannabis starting January 1, 2020, while Michigan launched its program in 2018. 

Local police departments accounted for the majority of the arrests, with 12,162. County Sheriff’s Departments arrested 7,736 people during the analysis period, while State Police recorded 1,466 arrests.   

Most of those arrested (11,872) were Indiana residents, while 3,690 of those arrested were from Illinois, and 4,582 were from other states. 

Ganjapreneur: Offering daily insights since 2014, the leading digital business journal for cannabis industry professionals. Subscribe to the newsletter to join our community of over 40,000 ganjapreneurs.

Source link

A federal health agency has published a new report on recent advances in psychedelic medicine, along with recommendations for state policymakers on how to prepare for formal approval of drugs like psilocybin and MDMA. It also notes how the Schedule I status of many psychedelics has hampered scientific studies on their effects for decades.

“Psychedelic-assisted therapy is moving from research settings toward clinical practice faster than most observers anticipated even 5 years ago,” the report published on Wednesday by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) says.

The document says that substances such as psilocybin, LSD and MDMA “show potential in clinical studies for treating depression, post-traumatic stress disorder, anxiety, and substance use disorders,” though it cautions that the evidence base “remains uneven and important methodological limitations persist.”

The SAMHSA report notes that President Donald Trump issued an executive order aimed at expanding and expediting research on the potential therapeutic benefits of psychedelics in April with an eye toward federal approval of psychedelic medications by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

State officials should “consider planning now for the fiscal, legal, and operational implications of potential FDA-approved psychedelic therapies, including any Medicaid coverage obligations,” it says.

They should also work toward “developing oversight frameworks, including credentialing standards, safety protocols, informed consent processes, and complaint mechanisms proactively, before psychedelic therapies are formally made available for state system service recipients,” the SAMHSA report recommends.

“States should engage with the federal regulatory process and coordinate across agencies so that relevant decision-makers in states are informed and prepared when psychedelic policy proposals arise.”

One methodological issue with most psychedelic research to date, the paper notes, is that clinical trials have largely excluded people with serious mental illness, low incomes and complex trauma histories—”precisely the populations that state mental health systems primarily serve.”

The SAMHSA paper provides an overview of the traditional and cultural use of psychedelics, as well as their legal status in the U.S., noting that their placement in Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act (CSA) meant that “clinical research into psychedelics was substantially limited” for decades.

“This classification was viewed by many as a response to cultural panic surrounding recreational drug use in the 1960s rather than a science-based assessment,” it says.

Research has picked up in recent years, however, and FDA has granted “breakthrough therapy” status to several psychedelics, including psilocybin, MDMA and a 5-MeO-DMT formulation.

If any psychedelics are approved by FDA, key questions will arise about coverage through Medicaid and other programs—both for the drug itself as well as therapeutic sessions that can last for several hours.

“State Medicaid agencies could theoretically cover the drug but not the associated services. Such an arrangement would create a dilemma because the evidence for benefit appears inseparable from the therapeutic framework,” the report says. “Prescribing psilocybin or other psychedelics for unsupervised home use is not supported by the current evidence.”

But “if states are required to cover both the medication and therapeutic services, the budgetary implications are substantial,” the SAMHSA analysis notes.

In any case, the federal overview says that regardless of whether states approve or cover any psychedelic medicines or services, “access and use are already happening.”

“The question is not whether individuals in a particular state will use psychedelics, but whether they will do so in regulated, safe contexts or in underground networks,” it says. This has implications for what information to gather, what public health communications to develop, and what policies to put in place proactively.”

The report also says that an ongoing “fundamental legal tension is that federal and state laws may not align.”

“A state that permits psychedelic-assisted therapy outside of FDA-approval or authorized right-to-try expanded access creates a situation in which the state is facilitating conduct that remains federally criminal. This is not unprecedented (medical cannabis states face similar tensions), but it represents a real legal risk. State attorney general offices may be able to provide guidance on whether prescribers can legally administer Schedule I compounds under state law even when federal law prohibits them.”

Whatever happens at the federal level, psychedelics are unlikely to recede from public attention,” it says. “The science will continue to accumulate, and state agencies will face questions from service recipients, their families, providers, legislators, and others.”

“State mental health directors do not need to become advocates for psychedelic-assisted therapy, but they must be informed. The evidence base, the regulatory momentum, and the budget implications are all substantive enough to warrant serious attention now. The most prudent course is to stay informed, engage with the evidence critically, prepare for the possibility that FDA-approved psychedelic therapies may arrive soon, and think carefully about how these therapies might fit into the broader mission of serving people with mental health conditions and substance use disorders, including individuals with serious mental illness. These decisions are likely to come whether or not states are ready for them, and it will be easier to develop informed positions in advance than to react under pressure.”

Last month, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) announced a partnership to collaborate on research and development of psychedelic medicines to treat people struggling with serious mental health conditions.

Separately, FDA issued finalized guidance to help researchers studying the therapeutic benefits of psychedelics navigate the “unique challenges” of such investigations. The agency also announced it will be holding a public hearing on psychedelic therapy issues in September.

Previously, FDA and HHS in April announced steps that they say will help with “accelerating” therapeutic access to psychedelics for patients dealing with serious mental health conditions.

In May, a bipartisan coalition of 32 members of Congress sent a letter urging FDA to expedite ongoing reviews of psychedelic therapies.

Lawmakers recently filed a new bill that would require the Department of Defense (DOD) to evaluate how ongoing research on the therapeutic benefits of psilocybin could help members of the military.

A separate recently introduced bipartisan measure is intended to codify Trump’s psychedelics executive order into law.

An amendment adopted as part of the National Defense Authorization Act would extend a psychedelics research effort at DOD for an additional six years.

Source link

“At the state level, we probably have more questions than answers.”

By Makenzie Huber, South Dakota Searchlight

A federal change in medical marijuana’s legal classification should help South Dakota’s medical cannabis industry claim business tax deductions and gain access to banking, officials told state lawmakers Monday, but questions remain about the broader impact.

Whitney Brunner, administrator of the state’s medical cannabis program, told the legislative Medical Marijuana Oversight Committee during a meeting at the Capitol in Pierre that the federal government has shared little information about the change with the state—other than to request data.

“At the state level, we probably have more questions than answers,” Brunner said.

In April, the federal government moved medical marijuana from Schedule I to Schedule III under federal drug law. Schedule I drugs are considered to have no accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse. Schedule III drugs are recognized as having accepted medical uses and a lower potential for abuse.

Recreational marijuana remains a Schedule I drug under federal policy, even though 24 states and the District of Columbia allow recreational cannabis in various forms. South Dakota does not allow recreational marijuana use.

Medical marijuana has been legal in South Dakota since 2021, after voters approved it through a citizen-led ballot measure in 2020. Since then, South Dakota has built a regulatory framework—including licensing systems, testing requirements and oversight.

Brunner did not say whether South Dakota businesses will be required to register with the Drug Enforcement Administration to participate in the state program or what new compliance requirements they might face.

Kittrick Jeffries, chairman of the Cannabis Industry Association of South Dakota and owner of Puffy’s Dispensary in Rapid City, said some businesses are taking the initiative.

“A lot of our establishments within our association are currently going through the DEA inspection process to become licensed under the DEA,” Jeffries said.

Cannabis businesses have long been blocked from taking certain federal tax deductions because marijuana was classified as a Schedule I substance—meaning they couldn’t deduct ordinary business expenses the way other businesses can. Banks have also largely avoided working with cannabis businesses because marijuana remains broadly illegal under federal law, exposing financial institutions to regulatory penalties even in states where it’s legal.

The reclassification will allow medical cannabis businesses to claim deductions, said Nicole Ezeh, a presenter with the National Conference of State Legislatures. It should also ease banking access for the industry.

The federal changes come as South Dakota’s program is in transition. Brunner told lawmakers the department overhauled its medical cannabis inspection program over the last year, after inspectors were missing violations and citing establishments inconsistently.

“We realized last year, and it wasn’t a difficult realization to make, that we had a lot of work to do on inspections and our processes,” Brunner said.

The department created new procedures and training, reorganized its supervisor structure and added a formal process for businesses to challenge citations, Brunner said.

Rob Krogstad, who operates Bad River Cannabis in Fort Pierre, told lawmakers his business was fined $3,000 for two “clerical errors” that were corrected before inspectors left the building.

“There will be human error,” Krogstad said, adding that the fine forced the business to delay other operational expenses. He suggested a three-strikes approach for minor clerical errors, with immediate fines reserved for more serious violations.

A rules package moving through administrative review would “make this a little easier on establishments,” Brunner said. The package would simplify language around inventory tracking training and reduce how long businesses must store security camera footage—changes Brunner said would be less expensive and less “cumbersome.”

The rules package would also restructure the fines system, making first-offense minor violations result in a corrective action plan rather than an immediate fine.

This story was first published by South Dakota Searchlight.

Source link

Federally legalizing marijuana would generate $57.9 billion in new tax revenue over a decade, according to a new Yale University analysis—and additional states also moving to legalize cannabis would nearly double that haul.

The report, from the university’s Budget Lab, notes that the “cannabis market has grown into a substantial economic sector” but caveats that there is an “unusual degree of uncertainty” about the fiscal projections, however, given the “complicated legal context” of marijuana.

“Marijuana presents an appealing target for taxation,” the Yale analysis says, noting that it is considered by many policymakers to be “socially undesirable”—as is the case with alcohol and cigarettes.

“A tax levied specifically on marijuana could serve the dual purposes of discouraging use and raising revenue, thereby funding new public spending or replacing taxes on socially desirable activities like work or savings,” it says.

Researchers projected that if cannabis were federally rescheduled and an excise tax of $0.00625 per mg of THC were applied, a gram of marijuana would be taxed at $1.31. “At an average price of $8.59 per gram of marijuana, this tax would amount to about a 15% increase in the tax-inclusive price,” the report says.

The tax would result in $57.9 billion in new revenue over the course of ten years, the researchers project, If all remaining states were to also legalize marijuana in their jurisdictions, the total haul would be $111.3 billion over a decade.

The Yale report bases its estimates on existing state tax revenue to determine that the recreational marijuana market was about $25 billion in 2024

“We project that, if the market continues to grow without federal legalization or any new states legalizing, the market will reach nearly $40 billion in 2035,” it says. “The medical segment, while more established, represents the smaller share of total activity at only about 20 percent. As such, the medical marijuana segment accounts for between $5 and $8 billion in sales each year from 2024-2035.”

Uncertainties underlying the revenue estimates include how much illicit activity would convert to the regulated market under legalization, as well as the effect of taxes on consumer purchases.

Legalization would also cause some cannabis workers who are not currently paying income and/or payroll taxes to begin doing so.

“Federal legalization would likely generate income and payroll tax revenue beyond that collected through the excise tax. Workers in the illicit cannabis economy—cultivators, trimmers, distributors, and retail-facing sellers—currently earn income that is neither reported to the IRS nor subject to FICA withholding, because their employers have no lawful basis for establishing formal employment relationships at the federal level. Federal legalization would bifurcate this formerly invisible workforce into two distinct categories for tax purposes. Employees absorbed into licensed, formally structured cannabis firms—the multistate operators, vertically integrated cultivators, and dispensary chains that already operate in the state-legal market—would receive W-2 wages, generating both the employer and employee shares of FICA taxes as well as federal income tax withholding.”

People who own cannabis businesses would also enter into the tax system and be subject to self-employment taxes or federal income tax on net profit—”income streams that are currently entirely outside the federal tax base,” the report says.

“Federal legalization could result in a large-scale transfer of economic activity from the untaxed underground economy into the tax-compliant legal market,” the analysis says. “This shift holds implications for income and payroll tax revenue that is analytically distinct from, and additive to, the excise tax revenues. The scale of the illicit market that would be subject to this transition is substantial.”

Another piece of uncertainty that researchers did not attempt to account for in their calculations stems from the fact that federally legal marijuana businesses would be able to take advantage of tax deductions and credits that they are not eligible for in light of cannabis’s Schedule I status under the law known as 280E.

Despite the uncertainty, the report says, federal legalization would undoubtedly lead to new revenue.

“Federal legalization, by eliminating federal restrictions on banking access, interstate commerce, and formal employment relationships for many illicit operators, would reduce the structural advantages that sustain the black market and pull a meaningful share of that activity into the regulated economy,” the analysis says.

A separately recently published federal report from the U.S. Census Bureau shows that states where marijuana is legal have generated nearly $15 billion in tax revenue from legal cannabis sales since late 2021.

Another report from the advocacy group the Marijuana Policy Project found that states have generated more than $28.4 billion in tax revenue from recreational marijuana sales since the first markets launched over a decade ago.

Source link

Cannabis reform’s sworn enemy is claiming credit for the quests to end adult-use marijuana sales in Maine and Massachusetts, where in the latter state signature-gatherers are allegedly resorting to deceptive tactics.

Smart Approaches to Marijuana, a Washington, D.C., area-based anti-legalization organization, is contributing “multimillion-dollar support” to voter initiative campaigns that, if successful, would end a combined $1.8 billion in annual cannabis sales, its founder and president claimed last week.

State-level adult-use cannabis legalization campaigns have had mixed success in past years, with voters rejecting adult-use pushes in Oklahoma in 2023 and Florida last year.

But never have state voters or lawmakers had second thoughts and rolled back adult-use or medical marijuana legalization.

That would change if voter-initiative campaigns in Massachusetts, where signature-gathering is underway, and in Maine, where the state attorney general cleared petitions to begin, are successful.

If passed, cannabis would remain legal for adults but medical cannabis would be the only legal sales channel.

Annual cannabis sales exceed $1.6 billion in Massachusetts and are approaching $300 million in Maine, according to state data.

Who’s behind campaigns to end adult-use marijuana sales in Massachusetts and Maine?

Republican Party-affiliated political operatives with the Coalition for a Healthy Massachusetts have declined to say who’s paying for the pricey signature-gathering campaign – and with campaign finance filings still not due, that information is not publicly available.

Wendy Wakeman, a spokeswoman for the campaign, again declined to identify supporters during a brief telephone interview on Tuesday.

But on Thursday, a few hours after President Donald Trump signed an executive order that, when fulfilled, will downgrade cannabis’ status under federal law, SAM co-founder and President Kevin Sabet claimed to be behind the campaigns.

“Now, today, for the first time, I can also announce our multi-million-dollar support for two grassroots campaigns to end marijuana sales and commercialization in Maine and Massachusetts,” Sabet said in a video posted to X.

“We still have the power to take back our public health.”

SAM did not respond to an email seeking comment.

Dark money, allegedly deceptive tactics behind anti-legalization effort

With campaign finance forms not yet filed, it’s still not known exactly how much cash SAM is devoting to the causes.

SAM’s backers have long been a contentious subject of speculation in the cannabis advocacy world.

SAM Action, a 501(c)4 affiliate of the organization, recently claimed to have spent in excess of $100,000 on television ads urging Trump not to reschedule cannabis.

Critics point out that Internal Revenue Service reporting rules allow 501(c)4 organizations to hide their donors.

In Massachusetts, campaign workers stand accused of attempting to deceive voters into signing the petitions.

However, such tactics are First Amendment-protected activity, courts have found.

Source link