By Jason Ortiz, Last Prisoner Project
The federal government has conceded what advocates have long argued: cannabis does not belong in Schedule I. Yet the agency overseeing the rescheduling process is shutting out the people most affected by the outcome.
Schedule I is reserved for substances with no accepted medical use and high abuse potential. Proposing to move cannabis products from state-regulated medical programs to Schedule III is an acknowledgment of medical value—and that admission dismantles the core rationale for Schedule I classification. If the classification no longer fits, the criminal penalties attached to it must change as well.
Last Prisoner Project petitioned the Drug Enforcement Administration to participate in its upcoming rescheduling hearing. The DEA denied that application—along with every other application from pro-legalization advocacy organizations. The only outside voices permitted in the proceeding are groups that support continued criminalization.
"A decision about whether to continue one of the most outdated and destructive drug policies in American history should not exclude the people and advocates most directly affected by it," Ortiz wrote.
Over six years, Last Prisoner Project has helped dismiss, modify, or clear more than 250,000 sentences, supported 24 presidential pardons, helped pass 10 bills, and worked across 24 states. Alongside pro bono partners, the organization has contributed thousands of hours of legal work and distributed millions of dollars in reentry assistance.
One constituent illustrates what federal prohibition still costs in practice. Michael Pelletier was paralyzed as a teenager in a farm accident and later used marijuana to manage severe pain. He received a life sentence without parole in 2006 for importing marijuana from Canada. Trump commuted that sentence in 2021, but Pelletier still cannot freely use medical cannabis without risking his supervision conditions—because cannabis remains federally controlled.
Meaningful federal reform must address the harm done to people who have been incarcerated, supervised, deported, denied opportunity, or denied medical access because of prohibition. That means removing cannabis from the Controlled Substances Act entirely, expanding clemency and resentencing, clearing records, supporting reentry, and ending supervision rules that force patients to choose between pain relief and their freedom.
Jason Ortiz is director of strategic initiatives for Last Prisoner Project, the leading national nonprofit working to free people incarcerated for nonviolent cannabis offenses and repair the harms of criminalization.
