Deep State DEA

Lawsuit filed to disqualify conflicted agency.

Daily Recap

Every party that applied to argue against moving marijuana to Schedule 3 of the Controlled Substances Act has full standing to participate in an upcoming landmark hearing, a top U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration judge ruled late Tuesday.

But only one organization supporting marijuana rescheduling will have full standing for the highly anticipated Dec. 2 hearing, according to DEA Chief Administrative Law Judge John Mulrooney II.

An “Interested party” is defined as “any person adversely affected or aggrieved by any rule or proposed rule issuable” under 21 U.S.C. 811.

Deep State Drilling

A DEA judge is being asked to remove the agency from its role in the upcoming hearing on the Biden administration’s cannabis rescheduling proposal, with a new legal filing citing alleged statutory violations that include “unlawful” communication with a prohibitionist group.

The lawsuit was submitted on behalf of Village Farms and Hemp for Victory, which were both invited to participate in the rescheduling hearing that’s set for next month—that is, before they were told to not bother to showing up.

“It is our belief that the DEA cannot lawfully act as the proponent of the Proposed Rule and that its actions throughout the administrative process demonstrate that it opposes the proposed transfer to Schedule III and is therefore compromised.”

Sugar Shane Pennington, Partner, Porter Wright

Wizard of Oz

President-elect Donald Trump’s recent selection of physician and TV personality Dr. Mehmet Oz to oversee the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services adds another pro-medical-marijuana voice to the forthcoming administration.

In recent years, Dr. Oz has encouraged audiences to be open openness to therapeutic cannabis and advocated for sweeping policy changes around the drug.

“We ought to completely change our policy on marijuana. It absolutely works,” he said in a 2020 interview, calling cannabis “one of the most underused tools in America.”

Big Red

Nebraska Attorney General Mike Hilgers pledged Tuesday that his office’s ongoing civil and criminal investigations into two medical cannabis measures won’t impact whether he certifies the election results.

“I see no reason sitting here today to not certify. We know the judge will look at all the arguments and the facts carefully, and so we’ll wait for a ruling.” Nebraska AG

Stocks & Stuff

It was a tense session in Cannaland as the space wrestles with year-end tax selling and overwhelming financial fatigue and attempts to ready for the Red Dawn. U.S. canna ETF MSOS finished the session +2% as it toggled between technical levels.

Below, we’ll synthesize the collective crosscurrents, digest current events and tell it like it is ahead of two days of travel and a brief digital respite.

All that and more, just scroll down.

SPY 0.00%↑ QQQ 0.00%↑ IWM 0.00%↑ MSOS 0.00%↑ ETF Notional: $50M

Top Stories