A Marijuana Policy Project (MPP) analysis of FBI data released on 4/20 shows U.S. cannabis arrests have dropped sharply in legalization states while remaining high in prohibition states.
Cannabis arrests peaked at over 870,000 in 2007 and fell to 211,104 in 2025, part of a cumulative total exceeding 21 million since 1995. The 24 states with legalization laws made 222,261 fewer arrests in 2025 than in the year before their laws took effect. On average, arrest rates in those states dropped 85.53%, with possession arrests falling 84.61% and sales arrests down 80.39%.
Despite having a smaller combined population, prohibition states made more than eight times as many cannabis arrests as legalization states in 2025—186,581 versus 22,357.
MPP executive director Adam Smith said "cannabis legalization across 24 states has driven a historic decline in cannabis arrests nationwide, from a high of more than 900,000 to just over 200,000 annually," adding: "That is still an alarmingly high number, with each of those arrests representing an actual person whose current reality and future prospects may well be derailed by a criminal record. Across half of our country, hundreds of thousands of Americans are still being funneled into the criminal justice system every year for a victimless 'crime' that is very likely legal in the next state over."
The report includes personal accounts, among them a 19-year-old jailed 23 days for $20 of cannabis with $3,800 in resulting fines and fees, and a disabled mother and grandmother with progressive genetic neuropathy arrested for one gram and a pipe at a rolling stop who spent 46 days in an overcrowded condemned jail before charges were dropped, still has PTSD, and cannot recover her driver's license due to fines.
Separate FBI data show marijuana constituted 27% of all drug possession arrests—more than any other named substance. A National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML) analysis of 14 states found cannabis exceeding 50% of drug arrests in Idaho, Iowa, Louisiana, Nebraska, and Wisconsin, and more than 40% in Alabama, Georgia, Indiana, Kansas, Mississippi, North Dakota, South Carolina, Utah, and Wyoming. In Alabama, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, and Wyoming, over 97% of cannabis arrests were for possession, not sales.
MPP noted that even legalization states retain restrictions including home-cultivation bans and possession caps as low as one ounce. NORML also launched a consumer survey on cannabis policy across the U.S.
