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The governor of Illinois has signed a large-scale cannabis omnibus bill into law that doubles the amount of marijuana that adults can legally possess, significantly restricts hemp THC products and makes other changes to rules for how licensed businesses can operate. Gov. JB Pritzker on Friday gave final approval to the legislation, which cleared the House of Representatives and Senate about two weeks ago. As enacted into law, SB 3222 allows residents of the state who are over 21 years of age to possess up to 60 grams of marijuana flower-double the amount in prior law. They are also able to . . .

“The proposed measure does not place voters in ‘the untenable position of casting a single vote on two or more dissimilar subjects.'” By Chris Lisinski, CommonWealth Beacon A controversial push to revoke recreational marijuana legalization remains on track to be decided by voters after the state’s highest court on Friday rejected a legal challenge seeking to toss the measure. The Supreme Judicial Court ruled that the attorney general’s office properly certified and summarized the question, whose campaign is funded by a national dark-money group fighting legal drug use in multiple states. If . . .

“No patient should have to choose between their medicine or their job.” The post Maine: State Enacts Law Protecting Medical Cannabis Patients from Workplace Discrimination appeared first on NORML.

A key Virginia lawmaker says legislative leaders and the governor have reached an agreement on a proposal to legalize recreational marijuana sales through budget legislation this month following the veto of a previous proposal to enact the reform. Del. Paul Krizek (D), who sponsored the earlier measure to allow adult-use cannabis commerce and is serving as a negotiator for the budget, said on Friday that “we have a deal” on the marijuana issue. He was speaking a a press conference at which House leaders unveiled their broader budget proposal, which includes cannabis reform language. Krizek . . .

A Democratic congressman has filed a new bill that would drastically overhaul how drugs are classified under the Controlled Substances Act (CSA), including by letting states effectively force federal rescheduling by changing their own local laws. Under current law, federal officials conduct a multi-part analysis to determine which, if any of CSA’s five schedules to place drugs in-depending on factors such as their medical use, potential for abuse and safety or dependence liability. But advocates have complained that those criteria are ambiguous and that the Drug Enforcement Administration . . .

The Pennsylvania Senate rejected legislation to remove oversight of the state’s medical cannabis program from the Department of Health and establish a new and independent Pennsylvania Cannabis Control Board, PennLive reports. Authored by state Sen. Dan Laughlin (R), the proposal would also have granted the new agency regulatory power over intoxicating hemp products, as well as over any future adult-use cannabis market in the state. Laughlin said he knew the proposal would be opposed by some Republicans, but that he didn’t know until the last minute that Democrats were going to unite against . . .

A new North Carolina Senate proposal would create a 21-year age requirement for purchasing or possessing hemp products, including delta-8 or delta-9-infused edibles and beverages, WRAL News reports. The bipartisan Senate Bill 59 advanced to the House Rules Committee on Wednesday. The proposal would also set the age requirement for purchasing kratom at 21. The issue is popular among both Republicans and Democrats, and Gov. Josh Stein (D) has also called for better regulation of the products, but previous efforts have faltered. “We’ve got the good sense to put an age limit on these types of . . .

Ukraine’s Ministry of Health has announced that the country’s medical cannabis program is officially operational, with the first prescribed products being purchased by a handful of patients on Thursday. The THC capsules were dispensed at a pharmacy in the city of Vinnytsia to two veterans suffering from chronic neuropathic pain and phantom limb pain following amputation and a woman with multiple sclerosis. Officials said that medical cannabis-based medicines are now available for purchase at six pharmacies belonging to a single licensed entity in Vinnytsia, Dnipro, Lviv, Ivano-Frankivsk, . . .

The Trump administration’s move to federally reschedule marijuana opens the door to interstate cannabis commerce-and it could happen through one of several unique pathways-according to a leading advocacy group. The Marijuana Policy Project (MPP) said in a recent analysis that it’s closely monitoring the implications of a Justice Department order that moved medical cannabis authorized by states from Schedule I to Schedule III of the Controlled Substances Act (CSA)-reasoning that “interstate commerce between licensed businesses would thus also be presumably federally legal” under the federal . . .

THE BIG IDEA Hi all, Excited to say that renowned drug historian Emily Dufton, will cover the DEA’s historic REC rescheduling hearings which begin at the end of the month. Dufton’s books include the essential 2017 history Grass Roots: The rise and fall and rise of marijuana in America and she’ll bring her deep expertise to the proceedings. Thursday she’ll join me on WeedWeek Wonks to kick off her coverage. Here’s the news, Alex FROM WEEDWEEK Trulieve debuts on NYSE In a long awaited milestone for the licensed industry, Florida-based MSO Trulieve went public on the New York Stock Exchange. The . . .

An interview with John Paul on the build decisions that cost operators millions Most cannabis facility failures are not failures of cultivation. They are failures of procurement, made long before the plant ever touches the room. John Paul has spent twenty years on the build side of that equation. He walks into cannabis facilities for a living. The first thing he looks at is not the canopy. It’s the entrance. The lab coat lie: where biosecurity fails first A lab coat is just a coat. It is not a pressure boundary, not a change-out protocol, not an SOP. The biosecurity envelope, the part of the . . .

Kentucky’s Democratic governor is calling out a top GOP lawmaker for having a “complete lack of humanity” after he suggested that state law enforcement officials should prosecute people who act in accordance with a recent executive order to expand medical cannabis access. Gov. Andy Beshear (D) signed the order last week to broaden the list of health conditions that make patients eligible to legally obtain medical cannabis. Days later, House Majority Whip Jason Nemes (R) asked Attorney General Russell Coleman (R) to ensure that state agencies “not cooperate” with the governor’s marijuana . . .

A Massachusetts campaign working to put a measure to roll back marijuana legalization on the November ballot has fired a signature gatherer it says was shown appearing to engage in “wholly unacceptable” conduct in a recent video. As Marijuana Moment reported this week, a man petitioning for the Massachusetts initiative as well as a similar anti-cannabis proposal in Maine was depicted in recent social media posts seeming to argue that voters who support legal marijuana access should sign the petitions in order to advance or protect reform. The Coalition for a Healthy Massachusetts-which is . . .

A Pennsylvania Republican senator is blaming the state’s Democratic governor for the defeat of his bill to create a new Cannabis Control Board (CCB) to oversee the state’s medical marijuana program and intoxicating hemp products and that could also one day oversee recreational cannabis if it is legalized. Most GOP senators in the Republican-controlled chamber voted for the legislation from Sen. Dan Laughlin (R), and all but two Democrats opposed it-with even some lawmakers who signed onto the measure as cosponsors ultimately voting against it. Gov. Josh Shapiro (D) “obviously weighed in on . . .

When it comes to publicity and marketing, plant medicine brands have always been forced to play by different rules. Restricted from mainstream advertising, penalized on social media, and fighting stigma at every turn, getting the word out has never been easy. And while mainstream newswires offer wide distribution, they rarely deliver meaningful attention: plant medicine stories get lost in the noise, ignored by outlets that don’t understand or care about this space. That changes today. Four of the most recognizable grassroots media platforms in the cannabis space: Ganjapreneur, . . .

A industry association that represents drug testing companies and a cannabis-focused biopharmaceutical corporation are asking a federal appeals court to block the Trump administration from moving forward with federal marijuana rescheduling while ongoing litigation challenging the reform is considered-claiming that cannabis is a “dangerous drug that destroys lives.” The National Drug and Alcohol Screening Association (NDASA), along with MMJ International Holdings and its subsidiaries, argue in the new filing on Tuesday that the cannabis rescheduling move is “a brazen agency overreach in which . . .

The art of glassblowing dates back thousands of years. The required skill and control drew praise for centuries as both a technical feat and a form of creative expression. In cannabis culture, glass is a symbol shaped by decades of creativity, rebellion and innovation. Robert James Raymond, a.k.a. Drakken Glass, a self-taught artist based in Las Vegas, represents that legacy by pushing the limits of what glass can be. Raymond says his love of glass began in childhood when he collected marbles and Venetian glass beads and turned them into jewelry. By 2007, his curiosity turned into . . .

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) last month granted Breakthrough Therapy Designation to VER-01, a cannabis-derived, full-spectrum drug for chronic low back pain produced by German company Vertanical. The designation follows two randomized, controlled Phase 3 trials, which demonstrated significant pain reduction, a favorable tolerability profile, and no evidence of dependence. In a direct Phase 3 head-to-head comparator study, the drug also showed superior pain reduction and better gastrointestinal tolerability than opioids. In a statement, Dr. Clemens Fischer, CEO of FUTRUE . . .

Kentucky House Majority Whip Jason Nemes (R) is asking state Attorney General Russell Coleman to help state agencies “not cooperate” with Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear’s recent executive order to expand the state’s medical cannabis qualifying conditions list, the Kentucky Lantern reports. Nemes, who made the comments Tuesday during an Interim Joint Committee on Judiciary meeting, called the executive order an “unlawful expansion of conditions” that the General Assembly did “not approve of.” “Any organization, any licensee, that participates in this unlawful expansion should be prosecuted. . . .

Members of Teamsters Local 916 at Ascend Wellness in Barry, Illinois, voted Monday to authorize a strike as they seek their first contract. The strike was approved by a 92% margin. In a statement, Shane Wilmer, a cultivator at Ascend and Local 916 member, said that the company “brings in millions of dollars every year off of [workers’] backs.” “This company can afford to give us the contract we deserve. We are ready to do whatever necessary to get a fair contract, and we are not afraid to strike if that’s what it takes.” – Wilmer in a press release The workers are seeking fair wages, . . .

Florida-based MSO Trulieve went public on the New York Stock Exchange in an important first for the licensed cannabis industry. The move follows the Trump administrations rescheduling of MED to a schedule III substance under the Controlled Substances Act and comes weeks before DEA hearings are set to begin on rescheduling REC. Trulieve CEO Kim Rivers has gained a reputation as the industry’s “Trump whisperer.” His unexpected decision to reschedule MED but delay action on REC Log in or become a WeedWeek Member to read this article.

Gynsyng Dispensary Lounge announced its hosting a ŪRY’s EDM Throwback Tunes Night in Merchantville in South Jersey by Philadelphia tomorrow night. It will be taking place Thursday, June 11, 2026, from 5:00 PM to 8:00 PM. According to a release, “the evening marks a dynamic fusion of high-energy nightlife culture and sophisticated adult-use cannabis lounge hospitality [ . . . ] Source: Gynsyng Lounge Announces EDM Throwback Tunes Night from Heady NJ

420 NJ Events presented the New Jersey Cannabis Showcase in Rahway in Union County, recently. Many licensed cannabis cultivators, dispensary owners, and other business professionals attended the event. NJ Cannabis Showcase of Creators The Showcase brought together those who are passionate about the plant from all around New Jersey. The cannabis culture can’t exist without connection. [ . . . ] Source: New Jersey Cannabis Showcase Held in Rahway from Heady NJ

Pot Brothers at Law, Round Table Discussions, and an Exclusive Q&A with the Office of Cannabis Management Highlight This Year’s Event ST. PAUL, MN – CannaCon, the nation’s leading B2B cannabis conference and expo, returns to the Saint Paul RiverCentre on June 26–27, 2026, bringing together cannabis entrepreneurs, cultivators, retailers, processors, manufacturers, investors, and industry service providers from across Minnesota and beyond. As Minnesota’s adult-use cannabis market continues to evolve, CannaCon St. Paul offers attendees a unique opportunity to connect directly with industry . . .

The online market for botanical products has changed dramatically over the last few years. Knowing how to separate quality from marketing has become more important than ever. Consumers have access to everything from herbal supplements and plant extracts to specialty wellness products sourced from different parts of the world, including legal cannabis in New Jersey. [ . . . ] Source: 7 Things to Know Before Buying Botanical Products Online in 2026 from Heady NJ