Author: Ben Adlin

[ad_1] More than a decade after Colorado voters approved a ballot measure making their state the first in the U.S. to launch legal adult-use marijuana sales, two new polls show that they don’t regret that decision. Roughly two thirds of registered voters (67 percent) recently told the Colorado Polling Institute that they see the reform, known as Amendment 64, as a positive change for the state. A separate survey conducted by Public Policy Polling (PPP) found that more than 7 in 10 (71 percent) Colorado voters think cannabis should be legal and regulated similarly to alcohol, while less than a…

[ad_1] A Nebraska bill containing a provision to set a 25 percent tax rate on hemp and CBD products—down from an initially proposed rate of 100 percent—fell apart this week, with its sponsor acknowledging on the final day of the state’s legislative session that it did not have the votes to overcome a filibuster. Sen. Lou Ann Linehan (R) asked the measure be pulled from the agenda on Thursday. “I’m willing to come back this summer, this fall, whenever,” Linehan said during floor debate. “But I hope we have a lot of conversations between now and then about all your…

[ad_1] A new survey of Americans’ habits, opinions and expectations around cannabis finds that nearly 6 in 10 adults are “surprised marijuana hasn’t been legalized across the United States yet.” The new Harris Poll report, released on Thursday, further found that 4 in 10 U.S. adults are current cannabis consumers, with about a quarter of those using the substance at least weekly. Meanwhile nearly two thirds (64 percent) said that “marijuana no longer carries the stigma it used to have.” “The numbers speak volumes,” Libby Rodney, chief strategy officer and resident futurist at The Harris Poll, a market research and…

[ad_1] A national Democratic Party group is bashing Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s (R) “harmful opposition to marijuana reform” ahead of the 4/20 cannabis holiday, calling out the GOP governor’s recent vetoes of bills to legalize retail sales and reduce sentences around past marijuana crimes. In a statement tied to the 4/20 cannabis holiday and shared exclusively with Marijuana Moment on Friday, the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee (DLCC), which focuses on electing Democrats to state legislatures, said Youngkin “continues to hold Virginia back and block the progress made by Democrats in control of the legislature.” Use, possession and limited cultivation of…

[ad_1] While uncertainty remains around how New Hampshire’s Senate will receive a House-passed measure to legalize adult-use cannabis, lawmakers separately took up a batch of bills this week that would make changes to the state’s existing medical marijuana system. Among them are proposals to allow patients to grow marijuana at home, expand qualifying conditions for the state’s therapeutic cannabis program and permit any doctor who can prescribe other drugs to humans to also recommend marijuana. None of the six bills heard this week were acted upon in committee, with House and Senate panels instead taking testimony and leaving action for…

[ad_1] A Republican senator in Pennsylvania has formally introduced a bill meant to remove state barriers to medical marijuana patients carrying firearms after previewing the legislation and soliciting co-sponsors earlier this year. Sen. Dan Laughlin (R) introduced SB 1146 on Wednesday, which state Senate Republicans noted in a press release was also 2A Day, celebrating the Constitution’s Second Amendment. The GOP statement called the proposal “a bold step toward ensuring the rights of all citizens,” saying it “acknowledges the importance of the right to bear arms, a fundamental aspect of American freedom.” “My legislation will make sure a valid medical…

[ad_1] A second committee in Missouri’s House of Representatives has advanced legislation that would legalize the medical use of psilocybin by military veterans and fund future studies exploring the therapeutic potential of the psychedelic. The bill, HB 1830, would in its current form allow military veterans who are at least 21 and are diagnosed with a qualifying condition such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) or substance use disorders to legally access laboratory-tested psilocybin. Meanwhile, aseparate budget proposal that would spend $10 million from state opioid settlement funds to study the use of psilocybin to treat opioid use disorder passed the…

[ad_1] Colorado’s Senate has approved a sweeping social media bill that, among other provisions, could force platforms to ban users for talking positively online about certain controlled substances, such as state-legal psychedelics, certain hemp products and even some over-the-counter cough syrups. The legislation, SB24-158—a broad proposal concerning internet age verification and content policies—would require social media platforms to immediately remove any user “who promotes, sells, or advertises an illicit substance.” Initially that provision would have applied to all controlled substances under state law—including state-legal marijuana—but an amendment last month from the bill’s sponsor, Sen. Chris Hansen (D), includes language saying…

[ad_1] With a legalization ballot measure set to appear on Florida’s ballot in November, Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) again attacked the proposal on Wednesday, warning that the changes would be “not good for families” and “not good for [the] elderly.” He also accused the initiative’s cannabis industry backers as being profit-driven. “People aren’t putting tens of millions of dollars behind that out of the goodness of their heart,” the governor said. “They are going to be making a lot of money if that amendment passes, so you’d be making some companies very, very rich.” DeSantis has previously predicted voters will…

[ad_1] In a new letter to the White House, a group of 20 justice and drug reform advocacy organizations are calling on President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris to publicly support the removal of marijuana from the federal Controlled Substances Act (CSA) rather than merely a move to Schedule III, as the government is currently considering. Biden has said repeatedly during his campaign and term in office that “no one should be in jail merely for the use or possession of marijuana,” but advocates in the letter said that “only the descheduling of marijuana will truly decriminalize it…

[ad_1] A new study aiming to explore the efficacy of CBD as a treatment for crack use disorder found that people who took the cannabinoid had better health outcomes and fewer adverse health events compared to those who took more conventional pharmaceutical treatments. “The main implications of this study point to CBD as a powerful and promising therapeutic tool for people with CUD,” says the report, published this month in the International Journal of Mental Health and Addiction. “CBD seems to mitigate the primary symptoms reported by the participants, such as lack of appetite, difficulty in reducing crack use, and…

[ad_1] Two officials with the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) spoke this week about the agency’s latest guidance and priorities for “protecting workers within the cannabis industry” in the growing number of state-legal markets. One official called for better tracking and reporting of negative health outcomes after recounting what she described as “the first fatality from occupational asthma in the U.S. cannabis industry”—a Massachusetts worker for the multi-state operator Trulieve who collapsed at work and died in 2022. The Tuesday webinar featured two OSHA representatives: Yasmine Daniels, an industrial hygienist with the agency, and Virginia Weaver, a doctor and…