DEA Blows Off Self-Imposed Marijuana Rescheduling Deadline

The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) was supposed to make a decision on whether to reschedule marijuana within the first half of 2016. But they are nowhere to be found during their self-imposed deadline.

A letter from the DEA in April read that it “hopes to release its determination in the first half of 2016,” according to The Denver Post. Last week a Denver Post representative was told by a DEA spokesperson that an update from the administration’s status on rescheduling was not available.

Russell Baer, DEA spokesperson said, “We aren’t holding ourselves to any artificial time frame.”

Once the DEA does present a decision, months of deliberations, reviews, and litigation could still take place.

U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand sent a letter to the DEA at the end of June asking, “that you [the DEA] take immediate action to remove ‘cannabis’ and ‘tetrahydrocannabinols’ from Schedule I.”

Rescheduling marijuana would also require a rescheduling of Marinol and other FDA-approved synthetic THC products.

Objecting pharmaceutical companies composed a letter saying, “By proposing that natural generic equivalents be rescheduled to Schedule III, the DEA acknowledged that this substance has a medical use, regardless of whether it is synthetically made or natural.”