Welcome back to The Year In Weed, The Blunt Truth’s annual roundup of cannabis-related stories.  As usual, I’ll adopt Dave Barry’s Year in Review format and look at stories month by month. Last year, I predicted that something would happen with federal rescheduling and Nebraska would run out of courts to weigh in on the signature collecting situation. Was I right? Kinda…

Let’s get the ball rolling with January. We started the year with a “prediction roundup.” And then we hit the ground running with a new interim head of the DEA. Elizabeth Warren offered a helpful suggestion to the DOGE team (remember them?): stop enforcing federal cannabis laws in states where it is legal.

February saw a lot of action in the states. Ohio began drafting restrictions on cannabis use, which some described as a move to overturn the will of the voters. Meanwhile, in Minnesota, the state started taking cannabis business license applications. Next door in Wisconsin, the governor included marijuana legalization in his budget proposal (again). Spoiler alert: it will go nowhere (again).

Which brings us to March, which came in like a lion, with the District of Columbia cracking down on unlicensed cannabis shops. Young people seem to be switching from alcohol to cannabis, with a survey finding three out of four substituting cannabis for a drink at least once a week. Going out like a lamb, the end of the month saw Virginia’s governor veto the retail market bill, in a surprise to no one.

And so we arrive at April, when New Hampshire tried (for the millionth time – only a slight exaggeration) to legalize adult-use cannabis. Supporters of adult-use cannabis in Oklahoma submitted a ballot initiative – if accepted, this would make the second time the voters have been asked to make their views known on this issue. There was no action on the federal level as regards rescheduling.

The merry, merry month of May brought cannabis lounges to Maryland and a licensing lottery announcement in Minnesota. We also had an entire week of NO: cannabis faced problems in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Nebraska.

And then it was June, a month that brought cannabis searches to Facebook and Instagram, for the first time ever. Hemp stories began appearing that month. In Texas, the governor vetoed a bill that would have banned hemp products with any amount of THC. On the federal level, Congress began discussing closing the “hemp loophole” in the 2018 Farm Bill. More on that later in the year…

July brought high temperatures and the end of the possibility of legal adult-use cannabis in Wisconsin, at least in 2025. Congress continued to debate various versions of a hemp ban. A new DEA head was approved by the Senate, and there was some doubt as to his commitment to rescheduling.

So what did we get from the dog days of August? The administrative law judge dealing with rescheduling decided to retire. It probably wasn’t due to the snail’s pace of rescheduling. On the state level, Delaware saw the opening of its first retail cannabis locations.

Before we knew it, summer was over and September was upon us. Anti-legalization advocates in Massachusetts began the process of putting an initiative on the ballot that would rescind legalization. Minnesota saw the opening of its first retail dispensaries not on tribal lands. And because no season is complete without a mention of New Hampshire, know that lawmakers indulged in yet another round of tilting at windmills (and you thought we were out of metaphors for this situation!) in an effort to legalize adult-use.

October brought us changing leaves and pumpkin decor, as well as a hemp ban in Ohio. And, in a continuing story, the Supreme Court decided to hear a case concerning gun sales to cannabis users.

Cannabis advocates in Virginia had much to be thankful for in November, as the newly-elected governor favors a retail market. Nebraska, perhaps the poster child for bumpy medical cannabis rollouts, saw the opening of a dispensary on tribal land. The state insists they can sell only to tribal members; the tribe says they can sell to anyone. But the really big news was the closing of the hemp loophole.

And so finally, 2025 draws to a close. In December, folks expressed their discontent with the hemp ban. The cannabis restrictions passed in Ohio. As for my predictions for this year, I was wrong in thinking the Nebraska courts would have finished with medical marijuana. But I was certainly right that “something” happened with rescheduling.

So there we are, 2025 all tied up in a nice little bow. What will 2026 bring? A retail market in Virginia seems a safe bet. And the Supreme Court will rule on the cannabis and firearms case. Further than that, who knows? Enjoy your New Year’s celebrations, and we’ll be back beginning January 9 to bring you a look at the news throughout the coming year.