A group of 12 Democrats, including Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), is urging the Drug Enforcement Administration and the Justice Department to deschedule marijuana, a move that would ease federal restrictions on the drug.
Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and John Fetterman (D-PA) penned a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland and DEA Administrator Anne Milgram on Monday, suggesting that they go beyond the Health and Human Services Department’s recommendation to move cannabis from Schedule I to Schedule III of the Controlled Substances Act.
The group, which includes Schumer and nine Democratic colleagues, instead calls for the drug to be completely scrapped from the CSA.
“Marijuana’s placement in the CSA has had a devastating impact on our communities and is increasingly out of step with state law and public opinion,” the senators wrote, later adding, “The case for removing marijuana from Schedule I is overwhelming. The DEA should do so by removing cannabis from the CSA altogether, rather than simply placing it in a lower schedule.”
“Rescheduling would do little to rectify the most severe harms of the current system,” the group continued. “Many of the CSA’s criminal penalties for marijuana will continue as long as marijuana remains in the CSA, because those penalties are based on the quantity of marijuana involved, not the drug’s schedule status.”
The nine additional Democrats on the letter are Sens. Cory Booker (D-NJ), Jeff Merkley (D-OR), Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), Ron Wyden (D-OR), John Hickenlooper (D-CO), Peter Welch (D-VT), Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), and Alex Padilla (D-CA).
The senators also noted that the Biden administration does not require congressional approval to reschedule or deschedule drugs on the CSA, something that would be difficult to acquire. Democrats currently control the Senate 51-49, leaving them nine votes shy of the 60 members needed to bypass the filibuster.
Most marijuana-related bills have failed to gain any traction in the Senate. Legislation legalizing the drug passed the House in 2022, when the chamber was under Democratic control, but died in the Republican-controlled Senate.
Several Senate Republicans have gotten behind a bipartisan push to lift federal restrictions on financial institutions looking to offer banking services to cannabis companies in states where the drug is legal. Forty states and Washington, D.C., have legalized either recreational or medicinal marijuana, though the lack of a federal framework has made it difficult for businesses to operate in more than one place.
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It passed through the Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee on a bipartisan basis in October. Schumer has promised a vote on the legislation, but it has not yet been scheduled.
Fetterman and Schumer are among the co-sponsors of the bill, as are Sens. Steve Daines (R-MT), Cynthia Lummis (R-WY), Kevin Cramer (R-ND, and Dan Sullivan (R-AK).