U.S. health officials recommend moving marijuana to lower-risk drug classification

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• Geoff Bennett:

  The Department of Health and Human Services is recommending a major change in the way the federal government treats marijuana, but stops short of saying it should be decriminalized under federal law.

  John Yang has the details.

• John Yang:

  Geoff, the recommendation is part of a review that President Biden ordered last year.

  HHS says marijuana should no longer be a Schedule 1 controlled substance, like heroin and LSD, which the law defines as having no accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse. Instead, HHS says the Drug Enforcement Administration should classify marijuana as a Schedule 3 substance, defined as having a lower potential for abuse.

  Other Class 3 substances include anabolic steroids and painkillers with small amounts of codeine. DEA, which is part of the Justice Department, will have the final say on this.

  Natalie Fertig covers federal cannabis policy for Politico.

  Natalie, I just want to underscore something that Geoff said in the introduction. This is not — what they're — they are not recommending decriminalization; is that right?

• Natalie Fertig, Politico:

  Yes.

  And that's very important to remember. This would change where cannabis lies within our — some of our criminal code, some of our tax codes, but it would not remove the federal prohibition cannabis at the state or the federal — well, at the federal level for states that have legalized.

• John Yang:

  And restrict — there would be some restrictions remaining?

• Natalie Fertig:

  Yes.

  So, a Schedule 3 drug is still overseen by the FDA. You can't walk into a pharmacy and buy Tylenol with codeine right from — right from the rack. But that would be the same with cannabis.

• John Yang:

  What would be the biggest practical effects of this?

• Natalie Fertig:

  So, the cannabis industry has been pretty hard-hit in the last few years, I think surprisingly to a lot of people, who thought this was a great way to make some cash.

  Part of that is that the federal tax code prohibits cannabis from being able to write off a lot of their business expenses, because they're selling a Schedule 1 drug. If it were moved to Schedule 3, that would no longer be a problem for them in the cannabis industry.

  Both small businesses and large companies would suddenly be able to keep a lot more of their money, and not be paying it in federal taxes. Could have a huge impact.

• John Yang:

  Huge impact for the businesses.

  What about for the people who want to use it recreationally?

• Natalie Fertig:

  So that's still going to be at the state level. This doesn't change that. This doesn't decriminalize federally, but some states — I mean, almost half of the country at this point has now legalized cannabis for recreational use, and more than half of the country for medical use.

  The state laws will probably stay the same. But what will happen is, will FDA decide to enforce cannabis the way that they enforce ketamine or Tylenol with codeine? That could make huge changes. But the people that I have talked to on the state level, in regulation on the state level, have said that is not an expectation right now.

  We — this is early days. It's still — we're still waiting to see what the DEA does, and then how the FDA will choose to enforce it.

• John Yang:

  As you said, I think there are 23 states, plus the District of Columbia, where small amounts of recreational marijuana is legal.

  Now, would this change in the other states — change anything in the other states?

• Natalie Fertig:

  States are still at liberty to continue to move forward with ballot measures with state legislative attempts to legalize either medical or recreational, much in the same way that they have to this point.

  If the FDA decides to change the way that they have been enforcing cannabis, which they have enforcement over it as a Schedule 1 drug right now, and they have not been enforcing — when people say, hey, this cannabis will help you medically, but it is regulated by a state, they have been hands-off in those situations.

  So they could decide to come in and say, hey, we're going to change how we are approaching state-regulated markets. And then that might make other states pause and not go ahead and legalize. But, right now, until we learn more from the federal government, it's still business as usual.

• John Yang:

  And this is a recommendation from HHS to the Drug Enforcement Administration. What happens next? What are the next steps?

• Natalie Fertig:

  So, the DEA does their own review of the FDA's recommendation, or of — and of HHS is recommendation.

  And that could take a month. It could take six months. Before this letter came to light yesterday, we were hearing that we would get an end to this process with the very broad range of somewhere between this fall and next spring.

  I don't know personally what the HHS letter means for that process, if it's going to speed it up or if that's still going to be sort of the frame that we — that happens. Once we get the FDA decision, though, we will know what comes next.

• John Yang:

  What's been the reaction to the HHS letter from both groups that are advocating drug legalization and groups that are against drug abuse, fighting against drug abuse?

• Natalie Fertig:

  Well, the industry is very excited because of the tax code change that I mentioned earlier.

  Drug advocates have been less excited, because what this reschedule would not — would not impact is the criminal code. It would not mean any major changes to federal criminality of cannabis. So they're saying, hey, Biden administration, during the 2020 election, you said no one should be in jail for cannabis. This would not make a major difference to that.

  The anti-drug groups then are also not stoked. They're saying, this is making people see cannabis as less harmful or as less potentially abusive, as they, the anti-drug groups, claim it to be. So no one's happy.

  (laughter)

• John Yang:

  Natalie Fertig from Politico, thank you very much.

• Natalie Fertig:

  Yes, thanks for having me.