Nearly 400 Cannabis Operators Have Filed With the DEA. The Window Closes June 26.

On the morning of Tuesday, April 29, 2026 — six days after Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche signed the final order rescheduling state-licensed medical cannabis to Schedule III — Trulieve Cannabis Corp. became the first major multistate operator to announce it had filed applications with the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration to register its medical dispensary footprint under federal law. By that afternoon, the DEA's medical marijuana dispensary registration portal was live.

In the three weeks since, nearly 400 cannabis operators have filed applications. Verano Holdings, Green Thumb Industries, and Glass House Brands have each followed Trulieve's lead. The DEA's 60-day expedited filing window closes June 26, 2026. Operators who miss it lose the right to keep selling medical cannabis while their applications are processed.

The fees themselves are modest by industry standards. The cost of missing the window is not. For a state-licensed medical cannabis business that depends on continuity of operations, the choice between filing by June 26 and waiting it out is no choice at all. June 26 is, in practical terms, the new federal compliance deadline for the medical cannabis industry.

The April 23 order — technically signed April 22 and published in the Federal Register April 28 — moved two specific categories of cannabis from Schedule I to Schedule III: FDA-approved cannabis products (already a small set, including Epidiolex) and state-licensed medical cannabis. Recreational and adult-use cannabis, which still generates the majority of revenue for most publicly traded multistate operators, remained Schedule I.

The legal mechanism was unusual. Rather than completing the standard notice-and-comment rulemaking process — which had stalled across two administrations — the Department of Justice invoked treaty compliance authority under 21 U.S.C. § 811(d)(1). The same provision was used in 2018 to schedule certain FDA-approved cannabidiol products. Treaty-compliance authority allows immediate effect; there is no public comment period.

For state-licensed operators, the practical mechanics are spelled out in the DEA's expedited registration pathway. Within 60 days of publication, eligible medical cannabis businesses can file Form 510 for cultivation, manufacturing, distribution, or laboratory analysis. Dispensary applications use a new dedicated portal. The state license itself serves as conclusive evidence of state-law authorization. Applications filed within the window are deemed approved unless the DEA actively notifies the applicant otherwise.

Trulieve, with more than 200 medical dispensaries across nine states, filed first. The company filed for 206 of its state-licensed medical retail locations on April 29 — likely the largest single multi-location DEA application package in cannabis history. Verano Holdings followed in early May, then Green Thumb Industries (parent of RISE Dispensaries), then Glass House Brands for its California medical operations.

For operators, the rescheduling does three concrete things, in roughly ascending order of impact.

First, it relieves 280E. Section 280E of the Internal Revenue Code prohibits taxpayers trafficking in Schedule I or II controlled substances from deducting ordinary business expenses — wages, rent, marketing, depreciation. For cannabis operators, 280E has translated into effective federal tax rates that industry analysts have placed in the 70-to-75 percent range. Schedule III is not on the 280E list. The relief applies, for calendar-year taxpayers, from January 1, 2026 forward, but only to the medical side of the business.

Second, the rescheduling opens a narrow door to international medical cannabis trade. Schedule III drugs that are FDA-approved can, in principle, move across federal lines and across borders under existing controlled-substance treaty provisions. The state-licensed medical cannabis that Blanche's order covers is not FDA-approved as a finished product — but the door is, for the first time, conceptually open.

Third, and most operationally significant, federal registration changes the relationship between operators and their financial counterparties. Cannabis companies have been blocked from major bank lending, default debit/credit card payments, and conventional insurance markets because their underlying activity was federally illegal. With state-licensed medical operations now registered Schedule III handlers, that conversation shifts.

Industry voices have struck a careful tone — celebratory but cautious about what the order does not do.

Kim Rivers, CEO of Trulieve, has been the most public face of the early-filer cohort, framing registration as recognition of patient-serving work that operators have been doing in state systems for years.

“DEA registration for our medical business marks a historic step forward for Trulieve and the patients we serve.”

— Kim Rivers, CEO, Trulieve Cannabis Corp

Legal counsel for cannabis operators has been more measured. The team at Foley Hoag, in its widely circulated client alert, emphasized that the order does not effect a broad rescheduling of cannabis. Marijuana that is neither contained in an FDA-approved drug product nor subject to a qualifying state-issued medical marijuana license, the firm wrote, remains a Schedule I controlled substance. Recreational cannabis, which continues to drive the majority of multistate-operator revenue, falls outside the order's scope entirely.

1. June 26, 2026 — the 60-day expedited-pathway window closes. Operators that file by this date can continue operating under their state licenses during the DEA's six-month review. Operators that miss it cannot. Expect a filing surge in the final week.
2. June 29, 2026 — the expedited DEA administrative hearing on broader rescheduling begins. This is the proceeding that will determine whether adult-use cannabis follows medical into Schedule III.
3. December 22, 2026 — the end of the six-month DEA processing window for early filers. Operators that filed by June 22 should, by this date, have DEA registrations in hand or formal notice of issues.
4. Recreational cannabis decision — the June 29 hearing is the formal proceeding, but the political signal from the Acting Attorney General's office through the spring will matter as much as the hearing record.

The open question is what happens to recreational. If the hearing concludes that adult-use cannabis warrants Schedule III treatment, the industry's federal compliance picture changes again, and another 60-day filing window will likely follow. If it does not — or if it produces a partial result, such as Schedule II for adult-use — the regulatory map remains the patchwork it is today.