What Trump’s Marajuana Reclassification Means For Texas
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On Thursday, December 18, President Donald Trump signed an executive order to reclassify marijuana as a less dangerous drug in an effort to open new pathways for medical research. This signals a significant shift in drug policy.
This reclassification removes marijuana from Schedule I drugs. Those are drugs like heroin and LSD that have no medical use. It will now be considered a Schedule III drug, which is a grouping deemed to have some medical value and less dangerous than Tylenol or codeine. Trump says, “The facts compel the federal government to recognize that marijuana can be legitimate in terms of medical applications when carefully administered.”
This reclassification does not legalize marijuana nationwide but could change how the drug is regulated. In Texas, marijuana is still a Schedule I dangerous drug, and this may not change anytime soon due to Texas LT. Gov Dan Patrick has recently made efforts to ban almost all THC products in the state.People like Stephanie Forkas, who is on the board for the Epilepsy Foundation of Texas, are on the board because her child suffers from epilepsy. Believes reclassification is needed in Texas, too.
She says, “What happened today at the White House does not change the battle for access to CDB for like full spectrum hemp-based CBD. That fight still goes on,” she hopes this reclassification sends a signal to Texas lawmakers.
Executive Director of the National Drug and Alcohol Screening Association, Jo McGuire, said that her organization is not only worried about this type of change being made by an executive order but also about the impact across the workforce under federal guidelines, such as bus drivers, airline pilots, and truck drivers.
She says, “Once we go to Schedule III, if we do not have a safety carve-out in place that protects the testing program, employees could very possibly not be able to test for that substance under the federal testing program. In fact, the labs might not be able to even include that in the federal panel.”
There is currently no timeline for when this reclassification will take place.
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