💸 The Tape

The schedule is set. The players are assigned. And in five days, the most consequential administrative hearing in the history of U.S. cannabis policy begins — with only one side of the argument invited to the table.

DEA Chief Administrative Law Judge Derek Julius issued the final hearing schedule on Wednesday, laying out a day-by-day, hour-by-hour framework for the proceeding that will determine whether all marijuana — beyond the medical cannabis already rescheduled to Schedule III — should be reclassified under the Controlled Substances Act. The hearing begins June 29 and runs through July 14, with each designated party assigned a specific date to present their case.

Here's the order of battle:

The Government opens on June 29, presenting its case as the proponent of the proposed rescheduling rule — a role that carries the burden of proof in defending the move to Schedule III. NDASA follows on July 2. SAM presents on July 6. DUID Victim Voices on July 7. Dr. Kenneth Finn on July 8. The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation on July 10. Dr. Phillip Drum on July 13. And the States of Nebraska, Idaho, Indiana, and Louisiana close the proceedings on July 14.

Every designated party is an opponent of rescheduling. Every single one.

Where Are the Reform Supporters?

They're not in the room. The DEA denied participation requests from the Drug Policy Alliance, NORML, and every other reform organization that filed a notice of intent. The rationale: since these groups support moving marijuana to Schedule III, they are not "adversely affected or aggrieved" by the proposed rule and therefore don't qualify as interested parties under DEA hearing procedures.

The result is a proceeding where the government defends rescheduling while seven designated opponents cross-examine its witnesses and present their own cases — and nobody on the other side pushes back on the opponents' arguments, challenges their expert witnesses, or presents countervailing evidence.

It's an asymmetric hearing by design — and whether that asymmetry produces a fair evidentiary record is a question that will follow whatever recommendation the ALJ ultimately makes.

The DEA's Unusual Position

One of the hearing's most fascinating dynamics is the DEA's own internal tension. The agency is technically the proponent of the rescheduling rule and must defend it. But this is the same agency that opposed cannabis reform for over fifty years, was accused of stalling the Biden-era rescheduling process, and whose institutional culture has been built around enforcing marijuana prohibition.

That tension is already surfacing in the pre-hearing maneuvering. SAM attempted to call a DEA pharmacologist as a witness — the same official who submitted testimony during the prior Biden-era hearing linking cannabis to psychosis, depression, and cognitive impairment. The DEA is resisting that request, apparently unwilling to have its own personnel testify about marijuana's harms in a proceeding where the agency is supposed to be defending rescheduling.

For reform advocates, the DEA's reluctance to facilitate anti-cannabis testimony from its own ranks is a cautiously encouraging signal. But skepticism remains about how vigorously the agency will actually defend the rescheduling proposal when its institutional DNA runs in the opposite direction.

What Happened to the Last Hearing

To understand why this proceeding matters — and why its compressed timeline is so remarkable — you need to know what happened to the one that came before it.

The Biden-era rescheduling hearing was the product of a years-long process that began when President Biden directed the Attorney General and HHS to review marijuana's scheduling in October 2022. HHS completed its scientific review and recommended Schedule III in August 2023. The Attorney General issued a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking in May 2024, receiving over 43,000 public comments. The DEA Administrator then convened a formal hearing, acknowledging that "the CSA requires such actions be made through formal rulemaking on the record after opportunity for a hearing."

Witnesses were identified. Prehearing statements were submitted. NDASA was designated to participate and planned to provide expert testimony opposing rescheduling. The stage was set for what should have been a landmark proceeding.

Then everything stalled. An interlocutory appeal on an unrelated procedural issue was filed, and the DEA Administrator never ruled on it — effectively freezing the entire hearing for 15 months. The ALJ cancelled the hearings amid litigation over alleged improper communications between DEA officials and hearing participants and disputes over witness selection. The process that was supposed to resolve the most important scheduling question in federal drug policy sat dormant while the agency that was supposed to be running it showed no urgency whatsoever.

The hearing was ultimately rendered moot when Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche bypassed the entire process in April 2026, using Section 811(d) treaty authority to move state-licensed medical cannabis directly to Schedule III by executive order. Blanche simultaneously cancelled the stalled Biden-era hearing and ordered a new hearing — this one — to consider broader rescheduling of all marijuana.

The Timeline Contrast

The contrast between the two proceedings is stark. The Biden-era hearing took nearly four years from presidential directive to cancellation without a single day of testimony. The current hearing was ordered in April 2026 and will conclude by July 15 — a span of less than three months from order to completion.

Acting AG Blanche's directive requires the hearing to conclude no later than July 15, giving Judge Julius just over two weeks to receive all testimony, conduct cross-examinations, and build the evidentiary record. After the hearing concludes, the ALJ will issue a recommended decision — though the timeline for that recommendation hasn't been specified. The Acting Attorney General retains final authority over whether to adopt, modify, or reject the ALJ's recommendation.

The Transparency Fight

Hanging over the entire proceeding is the question of whether the public will be able to observe it in real time. Judge Julius acknowledged the "national public interest" in transparency but ruled that the hearing will not be livestreamed or broadcast — a reversal from the Biden-era hearing, which the DEA had permitted to be livestreamed before it was cancelled.

Marijuana Moment filed a formal request asking Julius to reconsider, arguing that "limited physical seating in Arlington is not a meaningful substitute for livestreaming" and that "in a proceeding of this magnitude, transparency is not a courtesy — it is a safeguard."

As of publication, no response has been issued.

What Comes Next

In five days, the government will stand before an administrative law judge and make its case for moving all marijuana to Schedule III. Seven opponents will challenge that case with testimony, cross-examination, and expert witnesses. No reform supporters will be in the room to counter the opposition's arguments. And the public may have to wait for transcripts rather than watch the most important cannabis policy proceeding in federal history unfold in real time.

The Biden administration spent four years trying to get to this hearing and never made it. The Trump administration is getting there in three months. Whether the compressed timeline, asymmetric participation, and closed-door format produce a fair and durable outcome is the question that will define the next chapter of federal cannabis policy.

June 29. Arlington, Virginia. The hearing begins. Everything that comes after depends on what happens inside that room.

📈 Dog Walkers

$DFTX ( ▲ 16.45% ) Raises $700M

When your Phase 3 data is this strong, the capital markets respond accordingly. $700 million accordingly.

Definium Therapeutics announced the pricing of an underwritten public offering of 20.6 million common shares at $34.00 per share, generating approximately $700 million in gross proceeds — with an additional 3.1 million share greenshoe option that could push the total above $800 million. The offering is led by J.P. Morgan, Jefferies, Leerink Partners, and BofA Securities as joint bookrunners, with closing expected on or about June 25.

The raise comes days after Definium reported positive topline results from its Emerge Phase 3 trial, which showed its lead compound DT120 (lysergide) ODT — an orally disintegrating LSD formulation — delivered an 8.1-point placebo-adjusted improvement on the MADRS depression scale from a single dose, with effects lasting through 12 weeks. The data represented the strongest clinical evidence any psychedelic compound has produced in a registration-quality trial for major depressive disorder.

The speed and scale of this raise tell you everything about how the market is pricing the data. A $700 million offering from a clinical-stage psychedelic company — led by four bulge-bracket banks — would have been unthinkable twelve months ago. The bookrunner lineup alone signals institutional conviction that DT120 has a legitimate path to FDA approval and commercial viability.

Net proceeds will fund continued R&D, preparation for potential commercialization of DT120 if approved, and general corporate purposes. With Definium's second Phase 3 study presumably in the pipeline and the April 2026 Trump Executive Order prioritizing accelerated FDA review of psychedelic therapies, the company is now funded to pursue the full regulatory program through submission.

The psychedelic therapeutics sector has been waiting years for a moment like this — Phase 3 data strong enough to attract real institutional capital. That moment just arrived, and the check was $700 million.

🗞️ The News

📺 Trade To Black

ALJ Timeline Questions + CBD Data That Could Influence Federal Decision | TTB Presented by Flowhub

• Institutional Eyes on Cannabis: NewLake CEO Anthony Coniglio shares insights from meetings with small-cap investors in Las Vegas who are closely tracking federal reform momentum — cautious near-term but clearly re-engaging with the sector as catalysts stack up.

• Consolidation Consensus: At the IgniteIt Conference in Chicago, M&A was the dominant theme, reinforcing the view that the industry has too many operators and that scaled, well-capitalized companies will emerge as winners through the next phase of consolidation.

• ALJ Hearing Outlook: Coniglio provides his perspective on the hearing timeline beginning June 29 and what he expects to unfold this summer — including potential impacts on operator economics, capital markets access, and the broader rescheduling trajectory.

• Real-World CBD Evidence: Sasha Kalcheff-Korn of Realm of Caring brings nearly a decade of cannabinoid outcomes data to the Vantage Standard segment — the exact type of real-world evidence that CMS is seeking through its CBD Pilot Program, and what patterns are emerging from years of patient-reported outcomes.