Trump signs executive order that could reclassify marijuana as a less dangerous drug

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump signed an executive order Thursday that could reclassify marijuana as a less dangerous drug and open new avenues for medical research, a major shift in federal drug policy that inches closer to what many states have done.

The switch would move marijuana away from its current classification as a Schedule I drug, alongside heroin and LSD. Cannabis would instead be a Schedule III substance, like ketamine and some anabolic steroids.

Reclassification by the Drug Enforcement Administration would not make it legal for recreational use by adults nationwide, but it could change how the drug is regulated and reduce a hefty tax burden on the cannabis industry.

The Republican president said he had received a deluge of phone calls supporting the move and its potential to help patients. “We have people begging for me to do this. People that are in great pain,” he said.

Medical marijuana is now allowed by 40 states and Washington, D.C., and many states have also legalized it for recreational use. But U.S. laws have remained stricter, potentially leaving people subject to federal prosecution.

The Justice Department under Trump’s Democratic predecessor, Joe Biden, previously proposed reclassifying marijuana to a Schedule III substance. Unlike Biden, Trump did not have open encouragement from across his party for the move. Some Republicans have spoken out in opposition to any changes and urged Trump to maintain current standards.

Such a switch typically requires an arduous process, including a public comment period that has drawn tens of thousands of reactions from across the U.S. The DEA was still in the review process when Trump took office in January. Trump ordered that process to move along as quickly as legally possible, though an exact timeline remained unclear.

Polling from Gallup shows Americans largely back a less restrictive approach: Support for marijuana legalization has grown from just 36% in 2005 to 64% this year. Yet that’s down slightly from a couple of years ago, primarily because of declining support among Republicans, Gallup said.

Trump’s order also calls for expanded research and access to CBD, a legal and increasingly popular hemp-derived product whose benefits to treat things like pain, anxiety and sleep issues are debated by experts.

A new Medicare pilot program would allow older adults to access legal hemp-derived CBD at no cost, if recommended by a doctor, said Dr. Mehmet Oz, who heads the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

Still, the marijuana changes are not universally welcomed. More than 20 Republican senators, several of them staunch Trump allies, signed a letter this year urging the president to keep marijuana a Schedule I drug.

Led by North Carolina Sen. Ted Budd, the group argued that marijuana continues to be dangerous and that a shift would “undermine your strong efforts to Make America Great Again.” They argued, too, that marijuana negatively affects users' physical and mental health, as well as road and workplace safety.

“The only winners from rescheduling will be bad actors such as Communist China, while Americans will be left paying the bill,” the letter said, referring to China's place in the cannabis market.

In the early days of the second Trump administration, the Justice Department showed little interest in discussing marijuana rescheduling, which had encountered strong resistance from inside the DEA under Biden, according to a former U.S. official who spoke on the condition of anonymity in an effort to avoid retaliation.

Trump has made his crusade against other drugs, especially fentanyl, a feature of his second term, ordering U.S. military attacks on Venezuelan and other boats the administration insists are ferrying drugs. He signed another executive order declaring fentanyl a weapon of mass destruction.

Jack Riley, a former deputy administrator of the DEA, backed the focus on the drug war as a national security priority, but said marijuana rescheduling sends a conflicting message.

“He’s blowing up boats in Latin America that he says are full of fentanyl and cocaine but on the other hand loosening the restrictions that will allow wider exposure to a first-level drug,” said Riley, who was in the running to lead the DEA upon Trump’s return to the White House. “That is clearly a contradiction.”

Opponents like the group Smart Approaches to Marijuana vowed to sue if the reclassification goes through.

On the other end of the spectrum, some pro-marijuana advocates want to see the government go further and treat cannabis more like alcohol. Trump hasn't committed to bigger steps like decriminalizing marijuana, and said Thursday that he encouraged his own children not to use drugs.

Still, he said “the facts compel" the government to recognize that marijuana can have legitimate medical applications. And it has become a part of the health care environment in many states.

Currently, 30,000 licensed health care practitioners are authorized to recommend its use for more than 6 million patients for at least 15 medical conditions, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services found.

The Food and Drug Administration has found credible scientific support for its use to treat anorexia-related medical conditions, nausea, vomiting and pain. Older adults, in particular, are using it for chronic pain, which afflicts 1 in 3 from that age group.

Barrow reported from Atlanta. Associated Press writers Seung Min Kim, Laura Ungar in Louisville, Ky., and Josh Goodman in Miami contributed to this report.

President Donald Trump displays an executive order reclassifying marijuana as a less dangerous drug in the Oval Office of the White House, Thursday, Dec. 18, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

President Donald Trump listens as Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services administrator Dr. Mehmet Oz speaks during an executive order signing in the Oval Office of the White House, Thursday, Dec. 18, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

FILE - A medical marijuana plant grows at CRC on July 23, 2024, in Pike County, Ala. (AP Photo/Kim Chandler, File)

President Donald Trump speaks during an executive order signing in the Oval Office of the White House, Thursday, Dec. 18, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

President Donald Trump signs an executive order reclassifying marijuana as a less dangerous drug in the Oval Office of the White House, Thursday, Dec. 18, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

President Donald Trump displays an executive order reclassifying marijuana as a less dangerous drug in the Oval Office of the White House, Thursday, Dec. 18, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

MILWAUKEE (AP) — The “top levels of government” were involved in bringing charges against a Wisconsin judge accused of helping a Mexican immigrant evade federal authorities, her defense attorney told jurors during closing arguments at her trial Thursday in an attempt to blunt prosecutors' arguments that the judge acted inappropriately.

Prosecutors argued that Milwaukee County Circuit Judge Hannah Dugan put her personal beliefs above the law.

“You don’t have to agree with immigration enforcement policy to see this was wrong,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Kelly Brown Watzka told the jury in closing arguments. “You just have to agree the law applies equally to everyone.”

Federal prosecutors charged Dugan with obstruction and concealment in April. Jurors got the case around mid-afternoon Thursday after listening to four days of testimony and more than two hours of closing arguments.

The highly unusual charges against a sitting judge are an extraordinary consequence of President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown. Dugan’s supporters say Trump is looking to make an example of her to chill judicial opposition to immigration arrests.

According to an FBI affidavit and trial testimony, a team of six federal agents and officers traveled to the Milwaukee County Courthouse on April 18 to arrest 31-year-old Eduardo Flores-Ruiz for being in the country illegally.

He was scheduled to appear in front of Dugan in a state battery case and the team planned to arrest him as he left the proceeding. But Dugan learned the team was in the hall outside her courtroom and angrily confronted them with Judge Kristela Cervera in tow.

Dugan directed the agents to the chief judge's office, then hurried back into her courtroom, moved Flores-Ruiz's case to the top of the docket, told him he could next appear by Zoom and directed him out a private door into a restricted hallway. He emerged in the public hallway. Agents followed him outside and tackled him after a foot chase through traffic.

Dugan didn't take the stand in her own defense, but defense attorney Jason Luczak said during his closing that she would never jeopardize her career by “going out on a limb” to help the wanted man slip away. “Give me a break,” Luczak said.

He said Dugan was legitimately confused about how to handle immigration arrests in the courthouse and was concerned that the national immigration sweep is resulting in deportations that deprive crime victims of justice.

He stressed that Flores-Ruiz still ended up in the public hallway and agents could have arrested him at any time. He implored jurors to consider that the “top levels of government” are influencing the case and to act as a check on what he called “government overreach.”

But Brown Watzka, the prosecutor, insisted in her closing that Dugan went rogue because she was frustrated with immigration arrests in courthouses and intentionally distracted the arrest team to buy time to help Flores-Ruiz escape.

“A judge does not have absolute authority to do whatever she wants whenever she puts on her robe,” Brown Watzka said. “The defendant is not on trial for her views on immigration policy. She is on trial because she made a series of deliberate decisions to step outside the law in order to help an individual evade federal arrest.”

Brown Watzka pointed out that audio recordings from Dugan's courtroom picked up a whispered discussion between Dugan and her court reporter about who should guide Flores-Ruiz out the private door and down a back staircase. Dugan said she'd do it and that she'd take “the heat” for it.

Flores-Ruiz ultimately did not take the stairs and instead went through the private door into the public hallway, but Brown Watzka said that means nothing.

“The only thing that matters is the defendant’s intent,” she said.

Luczak asked jurors during his closing to consider whether the government manipulated the recordings.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Rick Frohling warned jurors in a rebuttal speech that Luczak was simply trying to distract them.

"This isn’t a referendum on ICE," Frohling said, referring to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. “It’s about preserving the rule of law.”

The case is a “shot across the bow” to state judges everywhere meant to intimidate them, said Howard Schweber, a political scientist and affiliate faculty of the University of Wisconsin Law School.

“It is unthinkable that this prosecution would have been brought in a prior administration,” Schweber said. “This is truly extraordinary, I would even say unprecedented certainly in my adult lifetime. I have never seen anything like it. And professionally its quite shocking.”

Associated Press writer Scott Bauer contributed to this report.

This courtroom sketch depicts Maura Gingerich at Milwaukee County Circuit Judge Hannah Dugan's trial in court, Thursday, Dec. 18, 2025 in Milwaukee, Wis. (Adela Tesnow via AP, Pool)

This courtroom sketch depicts Judge Katie Kegel at Milwaukee County Circuit Judge Hannah Dugan's trial in court, Thursday, Dec. 18, 2025 in Milwaukee, Wis. (Adela Tesnow via AP, Pool)

This courtroom sketch depicts Judge Laura Gramling Perez at Milwaukee County Circuit Judge Hannah Dugan's trial in court, Thursday, Dec. 18, 2025 in Milwaukee, Wis. (Adela Tesnow via AP, Pool)

This courtroom sketch depicts Milwaukee County Circuit Judge Hannah Dugan in court, Tuesday, Dec. 16, 2025 in Milwaukee, Wis. (Adela Tesnow via AP)