Night Court

Cannaland digests the latest delays.

Daily Recap

The DEA ALJ rescheduling hearing that was set to begin Jan. 21^st has been delayed.

After Village Farms and others tried to disqualify the DEA from its role as a bearded proponent of the proposed rule a second time, the administrative law judge stayed the proceedings for at least three months.

The ALJ was sharply critical of the DEA and condemned them for “unprecedented and astonishing” defiance. Judge Mulrooney offered that his chosen course of action could prevent a more extensive delay, particularly ahead of the new administration.

“The specter of officials at the highest level of Agency management selectively assisting and granting access to groups standing in opposition to the [NPRM] it purportedly supports carries no small measure of discomfiture.

Viewed in the best light, these allegations demonstrate a puzzling and grotesque lack of understanding and poor judgment from high-level officials at a major federal agency with a wealth of prior experience with the [Procedures].” ALJ Mulrooney

President-elect Trump already signaled support for the rescheduling process and we expect Pam Bondi, who’s confirmation hearings begin tomorrow and will continue Thursday, to fulfill his mandate, with 90-day incremental reviews as a gentle reminder.

The Department of Government Efficiency is also set to launch, and cannabis is a very loud and extremely popular Exhibit 1-A for ‘deep state bureaucracy,’ with Operation Choke Point (aka Sec. 10 of SAFER Banking) there for the taking. 👇

Captain Morgan

Cannabis advocate John Morgan lays the failure of November's recreational cannabis ballot amendment directly at the feet of Gov. Ron DeSantis and the public dollars his administration used to oppose it.

The pro-amendment campaign has estimated that DeSantis' administration spent around $50 million in ads that appeared geared against the measure. Morgan also bashed opposition from the hemp industry and law enforcement leaders:

"The lies (against the measure) that came at the end, it was hard to handle. We would have won had Ron DeSantis not taken $50 million from the taxpayers to (expletive) the taxpayers."

Hemp Stead

One of the largest cannabis companies in the country, Green Thumb, announced it will open a hemp products store that sells edibles and margaritas at the Salt Shed concert hall in Chicago.

The announcement comes days after Illinois lawmakers tried and failed to regulate hemp products, leaving the industry largely unregulated as it continues to grow.

New Fork

New York State cannabis regulators overstepped their authority and the constitutional rights of licensed hemp stores when they used heavy-handed tactics to conduct their warrantless raids of the shops, according to a court ruling issued Monday.

The seizures have been largely driven by new regulations governing hemp and canna that were quietly pushed through by the state Cannabis Control Board in late 2023, without public comment or the involvement of the state Legislature.

Stocks & Stuff

U.S. cannabis ETF shed 4% to register a fresh closing all-time low on what continues to be a whisper-thin bleed lower. Total notional in the ETF was all of $15M ahead of tomorrow’s confirmation hearing for the nominated attorney general.

Below, we’ll top-line today’s mishigas, revisit Honest Abe, chew through a few quotes, check charts, visualize the mirror image and step through the looking-glass to 3.0 in our never-ending search for the next GW Pharma.

All that and more, just scroll down.

SPY 0.00%↑ QQQ 0.00%↑ IWM 0.00%↑ MSOS 0.00%↑ ETF Notional: $15M