Equitable Opportunities Now comments on Docket No. DEA-2024-0059-0001

Equitable Opportunities Now (EON)’s mission is to ensure equitable ownership and employment opportunities in the cannabis industry for Black and Brown communities targeted by the War on Drugs. We support career fairs, trainings, networking, and other programming in addition to constituent-led statewide legislative and regulatory advocacy campaigns that expand equitable economic opportunities in the Massachusetts cannabis industry. To learn more about EON, please visit www.masseon.com.

Thank you for this opportunity for EON to comment on the DEA’s proposed rule on the status of marijuana under the Controlled Substances Act (CSA). 

Finish the Biden/Harris campaign promise to decriminalize marijuana by descheduling – rescheduling isn’t enough

EON agrees with the Massachusetts Cannabis Control Commission and others who have noted that “if the proposed rule is accepted, the ongoing discrepancy between federal and state cannabis policies will continue to create substantial legal and operational challenges for many individuals and businesses across the country, which in turn, may adversely impact patients and adult consumers seeking safely regulated products.”

While we appreciate the Biden Administration’s efforts to reconsider marijuana’s inappropriate classification as a Schedule I controlled substance, we have deep concerns about the insufficiency of rescheduling. Instead of keeping marijuana illegal under the CSA, it’s time to end this country’s failed policy of criminalization by completely removing marijuana from the CSA’s drug schedules. We urge the DEA to reconsider its proposed rule and issue a new rule to deschedule marijuana from the CSA.

Rescheduling marijuana to Schedule III is not enough. Marijuana must be removed from the CSA and should be federally regulated for both medical and adult use. 

Rescheduling does not address the challenges and injustices that must be reckoned with. Rescheduling will not:

• end federal marijuana criminalization
• end federal marijuana arrests, even for possession and use
• release anyone in prison for marijuana
• expunge previous marijuana arrests
• end deportations, immigration consequences, or tourist visa restrictions stemming from marijuana activity
• restore access to government benefits that people have lost due to marijuana activity
• bring state marijuana programs into compliance with federal law
• guarantee fair working conditions for individuals working in the marijuana industry
• facilitate patients’ access to medical marijuana

Overall, Schedule III is insufficient, even for the marijuana industry. For example, although placing marijuana in Schedule III would remove unfair and onerous federal tax penalties upon state-regulated marijuana businesses, it won’t give them legal access to essential business services and is unlikely to result in significant wage increases for workers or lower prices for patients and consumers. More importantly, rescheduling marijuana would continue the criminalization of most marijuana activity occurring in the United States such as personal possession, cultivation, use, and participation in state-legal marijuana businesses and programs.

The only way to end federal marijuana criminalization and its harms is to completely remove marijuana from the CSA, or “descheduling.” Guided by principles of public health and equity, a new federal marijuana policy should seek to end unjust criminal legal consequences for marijuana activity, restore rights and opportunities for individuals and communities targeted by marijuana criminalization, and ensure a diverse marketplace by protecting small businesses and equity programs from the emergence of national and multinational corporate monopolies.

Not only is the outcome of Schedule III insufficient, the process of evaluating marijuana’s status on the CSA is also flawed. The administrative review process conducted by the FDA and DEA is, by design, limited in scope and fails to consider the racist origins and impacts of marijuana prohibition which have produced overwhelming negative social, economic, and public health consequences. These generational outcomes are still felt by predominantly Black and Latino communities experiencing mass incarceration, inaccessible public housing, and denial of food assistance programs, among other detrimental consequences that will continue under marijuana rescheduling.

Moreover, for decades, the U.S. has played an instrumental role in creating and enforcing marijuana prohibition at the global level with devastating consequences around the world. With the changing realities at the domestic level comes a responsibility to start repairing the damage caused by prohibitionist policies and support initiatives that lead to systemic changes in the international arena. Consequently, the U.S. should undertake active diplomacy at the United Nations level together with like-minded countries to challenge the outdated global drug control regime.

Given the Biden Administration’s repeated acknowledgment of the racially discriminatory enforcement of marijuana laws and related harms, any process by the Biden Administration to develop a new federal policy for marijuana without these considerations is unjustifiable.

President Biden has repeatedly promised to decriminalize marijuana. We call on the DEA not to undermine President Biden’s campaign pledge by finalizing the proposed rule to reschedule marijuana under the CSA. It is imperative for the Biden Administration to follow through on this unfulfilled commitment by taking action now to end and repair the harms of federal marijuana criminalization. Because rescheduling marijuana fails to accomplish this, we urge the DEA to reconsider this proposed rule and replace it with a new rule to deschedule marijuana from the CSA.

Mitigating harms from rescheduling

We applaud Massachusetts Cannabis Control Commission Acting Chair Ava Callender Concepcion, Esq. and Commissioners Nurys Camargo, Kimberly Roy, and Bruce Stebbins for requesting “the DEA take steps to prioritize and assist those who have been disproportionately impacted by previous marijuana prohibition and enforcement” and emphatically echo that request.

In the event the Drug Enforcement Agency moves forward with developing a new regulatory scheme for marijuana, we strongly encourage the DEA to incorporate lessons from states like Massachusetts that show how this new industry can foster economic growth in underserved communities, support entrepreneurship and workforce development among people harmed by the war on drugs, encourage small businesses, and prevent dangerous monopolization with policies including:

• Protections for existing state social equity programs and licensing schemes
• Prioritization for businesses started by people from communities harmed by the war on drugs
  • Exclusivity period
  • 1:1 licensing ratio between equity and non-equity licensees
• Support for equity applicants and businesses
  • Grant and loan programs
  • Education and training
  • Technical assistance
  • Access to existing small business assistance programs
  • Waived and reduced fees
• Workforce development programs connecting justice-involved individuals to cannabis careers
• Policies that encourage other agencies and state and local governments to encourage equitable participation
• Requiring all market participants to develop plans to positively impact communities harmed by the war on drugs and hiring and contractor diversity plans

In the event the DEA moves forward as proposed rather than descheduling marijuana, we echo the Massachusetts Cannabis Control Commission’s request for “additional steps to reconcile these differences and provide clear regulatory pathways, enhance public safety, and support the burgeoning cannabis industry.” 

We further urge the Administration to partner with state regulators, testing labs, consumers, business owners, patients, physicians, people with marijuana convictions, communities harmed by the war on drugs, and other stakeholders to protect existing well-regulated marketplaces and support and protect restorative justice and other efforts to encourage equitable participation in the industry by people from communities harmed by marijuana prohibition.

We appreciate the Biden/Harris Administration’s commitment to criminal justice reform, and one of the authors was one of the recipients of President Joe Biden’s blanket pardon for federal possession. However, there is much more the Administration should do through regulation and Executive Order, including:

• Issuing guidance that prosecutions for cannabis-related conduct will be deprioritized, pardoning, releasing, and commuting sentences for people in prison because of marijuana prohibition; and ending cannabis-related deportations
• Expanding pardons for cannabis-related offenses beyond simple possession, for both civilians and military, calling on states to do the same
• Expressly stating the Administration’s support for Congressional action to legalize cannabis with regulations that prioritize reparative justice and equitable economic opportunity and protect public health, consumers, workers, and state regulatory frameworks and equity programs

Furthermore, as the federal government begins to regulate marijuana, it must empower all relevant agencies to support small business development and prevent the monopolization of the industry or the influence of predatory industries (including tobacco, alcohol, pharmaceutical, and exploitive gig employers) within the market.

Thank you for your consideration of these comments and your efforts to mitigate the harms of marijuana prohibitions. EON is happy to be a resource or partner anytime. Please direct any questions to EON Co-Founder Shanel Lindsay at shanel@masseon.com.

Thank you,
Shanel Lindsay, Co-Founder, Equitable Opportunities Now
Armani White, Policy Co-Chair, Equitable Opportunities Now
Kevin Gilnack, Policy Co-Chair, Equitable Opportunities Now