Sponsors (17)
Official title: Decriminalize and deschedule cannabis, to provide for reinvestment in certain persons adversely impacted by the War on Drugs, to provide for expungement of certain cannabis offenses, and for other purposes.
Introduced July 16, 2026 by Cory Anthony Booker · Last progress July 16, 2026
The bill shifts cannabis out of Schedule I and builds a broad federal regulatory, research, and reinvestment framework that expands economic and justice benefits for affected communities while imposing substantial new federal spending, compliance costs, and transitional legal and privacy risks.
People with prior federal cannabis convictions (including many people of color and low-income individuals) will have convictions vacated/expunged and some incarcerated people released, removing major barriers to employment, housing, and civic participation.
Communities harmed by prohibition, small and minority-owned businesses, and low/moderate-income neighborhoods gain increased access to capital, grants, equitable licensing, SBA support, CDFI and HUD funding, and targeted assistance to enter and expand in legal cannabis markets.
Patients, clinicians, and researchers get substantial federal research funding, coordinated research infrastructure, and advisory expertise to generate evidence on health effects, medical uses, impaired driving, and product safety.
Taxpayers face substantial new federal spending (research, DOJ and licensing appropriations, FDA and administrative funding, CDFI/HUD programs, and grants) totaling multiple billions through FY2030, increasing budgetary pressure.
Small businesses, producers, and retailers face significant new compliance, inspection, labeling, tracking, reporting, NDA/timeline and criminal/penalty risks under federal rules and tax changes, raising operating costs and legal exposure during transition.
Removing cannabis from Schedule I and adding a federal regime still leaves legal ambiguity and transitional uncertainty (statutory cross‑references, residual interstate restrictions, safety‑sensitive testing exceptions), likely prompting litigation and administrative burdens for states, courts, and businesses.
Based on analysis of 11 sections of legislative text.
Removes cannabis from federal Schedule I, creates federal cannabis taxes and an Opportunity Trust Fund, funds research and grants, updates banking and regulatory guidance, and establishes justice and workplace programs.
Removes cannabis from the federal Schedule I list, changes federal definitions and criminal penalties, and directs wide-ranging federal actions to support research, worker safety, impaired-driving prevention, banking access, tax collection, and restorative-justice programs. It creates a new Trust Fund financed by per-unit cannabis taxes, establishes new grant and loan programs, and orders multiple federal studies and agency guidance updates. The bill funds $1 billion for NIH/HHS cannabis research (FY2026–2030), appropriates annual amounts for impaired-driving grants and NHTSA activities, creates a Cannabis Justice Office at DOJ and SBA loan/technical assistance for disadvantaged cannabis entrepreneurs, and requires rulemakings, agency guidance (FinCEN, FDA/FD&C, OSHA/NIOSH), and GAO oversight to align federal law, regulation, and enforcement with the new legal status of cannabis.