The US revokes the visas of Latin American officials it accuses of links to the drug trade; the BC Supreme Court voids the conviction of Vancouver harm reductionists for distributing "safe supply" drugs, and more. 

[image:1 align:left caption:true]Marijuana Policy

California Governor Signs Bills on Marijuana Testing, Tracking And Consumer Access to Information. Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) has signed into law two bills dealing with product testing, tracking, consumer access to information, and cannabinoid content in the state's struggling legal marijuana industry.

Sponsored by Assemblymember LaShae Sharp-Collins (D),  Assembly Bill 1965 requires testing or retesting for all marijuana sold in the state and allows the Department of Cannabis Control to obtain samples for off-the-shelf lab tests. Under the new law, marijuana retailers must now provide a product's certificate of analysis if a consumer requests it. 

The bill also focuses on testing labs, requiring them to undergo performance testing "to ensure consistency of results across laboratories." That will include de "blind proficiency testing, round robin testing and any other type of programs that may be used to demonstrate competent performance of a testing laboratory," the bill says.

Sponsored by Cecilia Aguiar-Curry (D), Assembly Bill 2250 targets the hemp cannabinoid sector. It excludes cannabinol (CBN) isolate from that definition of "cannabis concentrate," building on an earlier law that removed CBD isolate. The changes mean that those cannabinoids won’t be subject to criminal penalties for concentrated cannabis.

This bill also bars businesses selling cigarettes or tobacco products from selling marijuana and expands the state's cannabis track and trace program to track information on cultivation, harvest, processing, manufacturing, distribution, inventory, sale and delivery.

Yet Another Poll Has Massachusetts Anti-Marijuana Initiative Losing. The Question 8 initiative on the ballot this November would end the state's years-long experiment with marijuana legalization by banning home cultivation and the legal sale of marijuana except to registered medical marijuana patients, but polling throughout the runup to the election suggests Bay State voters are not buying it. 

The latest poll from CommonWealth Beacon aligns with that trend. It shows 61 percent of likely voters oppose the initiative, with only 27 percent in favor and 11 percent undecided. Even if the initiative campaign scooped up every undecided vote, it would still lose by more than 20 points. 

No demographic group had majority support for rolling back legalization, and even among Republicans, support was only at 42 percent. Half as many Democrats (21 percent) favored the initiative.

In other recent polls, a University of New Hampshire survey found opposition at 71 percent, while a University of Massachusetts at Amherst poll found opposition at 55 percent. 

Foreign Policy

Trump Administration Revokes Visas for 27 Latin American Officials over Allegations of Corruption and Ties to Drug Trafficking. The State Department announced on Monday that it is revoking the visas of 27 Latin American officials, including Bolivia's top prosecutor, on allegations of corruption and ties to the drug trade. The officials targeted also include Colombians, Ecuadorians, and Peruvians. 

The State Department is "taking actions to fulfill the commitments to defend democratic governance across our hemisphere against corruption and narco-trafficking," it said in a statement announcing the visa revocations. "Under the Trump Administration, corrupt foreign officials can no longer freely enter the United States."

The move comes as the Trump administration's hemispheric anti-drug offensive, Operation Southern Spear, enters its second year of lethal attacks on suspected drug-running boats, and just weeks after Secretary of State Marco Rubio visited Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru to renew the administration's pledge to fight the drug trade and to jumpstart Trump's Shield of the Americas initiative. 

Bolivian Attorney General Roger Mariaca and family members are now barred from the US after Washington accused him of accepting bribes from drug traffickers. Mariaca wasn't alone—a dozen other Bolivian officials, including prosecutors, judges, a former justice minister, and a police official, all had their visas revoked, and nine more Bolivians without current visas are now deemed ineligible to receive them in the future. 

The visa revocations also targeted two Colombians, two Ecuadorians, and a Peruvian judge. 

International

British Columbia Supreme Court Throws Out Convictions of Harm Reductionists Accused of Drug Trafficking. The BC Supreme Court on Monday threw out the convictions of a pair of Vancouver harm reductionists who were found guilty of drug trafficking for handing out "safe supply" drugs at their compassion club, the Drug Users' Liberation Front (DULF). 

Finding parts of the country's Controlled Drugs and Substances Act unconstitutional, Justice Catherine Murray stayed the convictions against Jeremy Kalicum and Eris Nyx. Murray held that the DULF reduced the harms associated with the city's ongoing drug crisis and didn't negatively impact the community or public safety. 

The pair were arrested in a Vancouver police raid in 2023 and found guilty of drug trafficking last year. Their actions were "selfless," Murray wrote. 

"Mr. Kalicum and Ms. Nyx have borne the burden of bringing a successful constitutional challenge, thereby doing the public interest a service at considerable personal cost," Murray said.