State & Local Executive Branches

We could see a congressional vote on barring the feds from interfering in medical marijuana states this week, California stays contentious, the New York Assembly passes a medical marijuana bill (again), and more.

Kentucky will be growing research hemp crops this year after the DEA backed down from its refusal to issue a permit for imported hemp seed. A lawsuit and a visit from the Senate Minority leader might have had something to do with it.

An evangelical pollster has support for marijuana legalization at 58% (but not among Christians), the Senate Minority Leader takes on the DEA over hemp, a California defelonization sentencing initiative hands in signatures, we have a fascinating look at meth culture in Tehran, and more.

California battles over dispensaries and cultivation rules continue, medical marijuana bills move in Illinois, Minnesota, New York, and South Carolina, and more.

The feds will still arrest you for pot possession on their property in DC even though the city has decriminalized, Chicago cops will still arrest you for pot possession even though they could just give you a ticket, decrim initiatives are coming to Kansas cities, Minnesota becomes the 22nd medical marijuana state, Mexico doesn't want to legalize it, and more.

First it said Kentucky could have its hemp seed for research purposes. Then it said it couldn't. Kentucky is getting fed up with the DEA, and is now going to federal court over hemp seed imports.

A new designed law proponents say is designed to help babies will actually hurt drug-using pregnant women, advocates say. It's bad science and bad policy, they say, and they will keep fighting it.

Elderly senators grumble about new-fangled rules allowing legal marijuana businesses to use the financial system, there are more legalization polls, an Oklahoma US Senate candidate is talking marijuana reform, there is medical marijuana initiative news, Minnesota passes asset forfeiture reform and the governor signs it, and more.

Initiative signature-gathering campaigns are underway in Arkansas and Ohio and about to get underway in Oklahoma, the future of San Jose dispensaries remains unsettled, Minnesota lawmakers meet to search for a conference committee compromise, and more.

The DC marijuana legalization initiative picks up some welcomed support, there's a legal challenge to Washington state's ability to collect marijuana taxes, a Republican US senator talks drug reform and takes some jabs at Obama, fentanyl-laced heroin in killing people in Philadelphia.