Anti-Marijuana Group Hires Trump’s Former Attorney General For Lawsuit To Block Rescheduling Move Directed By President

Marijuana rescheduling lawsuit, served straight with a twist

Marijuana rescheduling lawsuit. Say it out loud and it tastes like aspirin in a warm beer—clinical, bitter, unavoidable. A leading prohibitionist outfit, Smart Approaches to Marijuana, just retained Bill Barr—yes, the former attorney general—to be the legal battering ram if the federal government finalizes its move to shift cannabis from Schedule I to Schedule III under the Controlled Substances Act. The irony drips: the same political orbit that cheered a hard-line drug era is now bracing to sue over a policy change initiated by a Republican president’s own executive order. Rescheduling won’t legalize weed. But it would finally acknowledge medical value, loosen the handcuffs on research, and knock out the IRS 280E penalty that starves the legal cannabis industry of basic tax deductions. That’s the marrow-deep fight here. Not culture war theater—cash flow, compliance, and whether the United States will treat cannabis like medicine or a moral panic in a childproof bottle.

The legal choreography is familiar and ruthless. Attorney General Pam Bondi hasn’t signed the proposed rule yet. When she does—if she does—SAM says it’ll sprint to court and also file an administrative petition to shove cannabis back into Schedule I. Barr’s firm has already danced this dance, previously helping the group push to stretch the federal comment period. Meanwhile, SAM’s president, Kevin Sabet, frames rescheduling as apocalypse by paperwork. He warns of a public health disaster, calls industry relief a pyrrhic victory, and claims the shift hands cannabis operators billions in deductions. The subtext is as loud as a siren: keep the financial screws tight via 280E, keep availability limited, keep the industry on its heels. Behind all this legal theater, the real question bubbles: when a government finally admits cannabis has medical value, do we let science and patients set the tempo—or do we retreat into old fears dressed in new suits?

Politics, though, is never neat, and the cannabis ledger has messy margins. The executive order to move cannabis to Schedule III didn’t come with a banking lifeline, despite rumor-mill whispers. At the same time, the White House also signed a spending bill that slammed the door on most consumable hemp products, while floating a plan to revise the law so full-spectrum CBD—potentially even for Medicare patients—could find daylight. That whiplash tracks with public sentiment that’s increasingly nuanced about hemp and THC access; see 4 In 5 Marijuana Consumers Oppose Hemp THC Ban Trump Signed Ahead Of Rescheduling And CBD Access Order, Poll Shows. And while rescheduling could finally end the 280E chokehold, other federal barriers still loom large. Agencies have defended excluding cannabis-adjacent businesses from mainstream support—just ask the entrepreneurs iced out of public capital programs as covered in Feds Defend Decision To Block Companies That Work With Marijuana Industry From Participating In Loan Program. In other words: you can move the schedule, but if you starve the ecosystem, it still withers.

The prohibitionist playbook doesn’t stop with rescheduling. SAM touts cracks in legalization at the state level, pointing to campaigns in places like Maine, Massachusetts, and Arizona that flirt with scaling back or undoing voter-approved systems. On the Hill, they’ve shepherded the “No Deductions for Marijuana Businesses Act,” an attempt to keep 280E handcuffs on even if cannabis drops to Schedule III. It’s all of a piece with a broader partisan theater where symbolism often outruns substance—the kind where an oversight crusade can try to change the subject entirely, as seen in GOP Committee Chair Wants To ‘Invalidate’ Biden’s Marijuana Pardons Through Autopen Investigation, Democratic Congressman Says. This is the landscape the industry and patients have to navigate: a maze of moral panic press conferences, court filings, and policy half-measures that talk tough on “public health” while leaving patients and small operators stranded in the gaps.

Strip away the rhetoric and you’re left with a simple crossroads. One path says cannabis remains a dangerous curiosity, best managed by stigma, punitive taxes, and ever-moving goalposts—everything from DEA petitions to Supreme Court briefs that lump responsible adults in with violent risk. The other path says we treat cannabis like any other complex public health issue: regulate it smartly, study it relentlessly, get medicine to patients, and stop pretending science should bow to fear. That last part demands infrastructure. It means designing retail ecosystems that actually serve people with real conditions, not just hype cycles and neon packaging. For a vision of what that could look like, consider Patients Need More Medically Focused Cannabis Dispensaries (Op-Ed). Wherever the rescheduling lawsuit lands, the next chapter won’t be written by press releases; it’ll be written by how we build, how we regulate, how we vote—and how we show up for patients and responsible consumers. When you’re ready to explore compliant, high-quality THCA products curated for discerning adults, step into our shop.