Arizona Tribune - Will State Marijuana Operators Get a Federal Green Light Before DEA Resolves MMJ's Seven-Year Wait?

WASHINGTON, D.C. / ACCESS Newswire / May 31, 2026 / Before a single witness takes the stand at the DEA Hearing Facility on June 29, 2026, there is a haunting figure that must be placed on the record: 2,500 days.

That is the approximate number of days the Drug Enforcement Administration-under the deliberate stewardship of former Administrator Anne Milgram and her deputies Thomas Prevoznik, Matthew Strait, Thomas Cook and Aarathi Haig-slow-walked, stonewalled, and bureaucratically suffocated a federally compliant pharmaceutical company attempting to develop life saving treatments for devastating neurological diseases.

Two thousand, five hundred days of form letters, hearings, court filings, unanswered applications, and a Schedule I Bulk Manufacturer Registration left to rot on a desk inside the DEA's Diversion Control Division-approved in every way that matters, denied in the only way that counted. While Milgram's January 2025 departure was quiet, the legacy of mismanagement and eroded public trust she left behind is loud, clear, and ready for scrutiny.

The Evidence: A Record of Systematic Obstruction

MMJ secured FDA Investigational New Drug (IND) approvals and Orphan Drug Designation for treating Huntington's Disease, only to be systematically blocked from manufacturing by DEA Thomas Prevoznik and his team.

• Orphan Drug Designation is a critical FDA recognition for treatments aimed at diseases so devastating that Congress mandated special incentives to accelerate their development.

• The FDA validated MMJ's science and potential, yet for 2,300 days, the DEA refused to act.

• The DEA's own Diversion Control Manual (Sections 5202.5 and 5201.12) mandates support for bona fide Schedule I research, a rule Prevoznik and his colleagues consistently ignored.

• Despite MMJ having already secured a Schedule I Analytical Lab Registration-meaning the DEA had already vetted its facilities, security, and personnel-the agency engaged in a blockade that defied its own regulatory framework.

The "Catch-22" Engineering of Failure

The DEA engineered a trap designed for failure: it demanded "Bona Fide Supply Agreements" that are unattainable without prior DEA approval, then cited the absence of those agreements as the sole reason to deny that very approval. This was not the random byproduct of bureaucratic incompetence; it was a deliberate, self-reinforcing barrier designed to ensure that no matter how many millions MMJ invested in federal compliance, the answer from the Diversion Control Division remained a silent, unaccountable "no".

The Faces of a Captured Agency

The names synonymous with this decade-long slow-walk are Thomas Prevoznik, Matthew Strait, Thomas Cook and Aarathi Haig. These officials have been implicated in a pattern of behavior labeled as both obstructive and corrupt, characterized by arbitrary standards and manipulative administrative practices. While they buried MMJ's applications, they oversaw an agency that turned a blind eye to recreational cannabis companies illegally exporting Schedule I substances internationally, proving that the DEA's standards were applied selectively to punish the entity that followed every federal rule.

A Constitutional Minefield: The Rescheduling Crisis

The DEA is now preparing to host the most consequential drug policy rulemaking in fifty years-rescheduling marijuana to Schedule III-using an adjudicatory system the Department of Justice has formally admitted in federal court is unconstitutional.

• MMJ exposed this constitutional defect, filing a motion to declare the DEA Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) structure invalid under Axon v. FTC and Jarkesy v. SEC.

• The federal government intends to proceed with rescheduling despite the fact that its own ALJs operate under a cloud of constitutional illegitimacy.

• This ensures that the rescheduling outcome will be legally compromised and vulnerable to vacatur from the moment it is finalized.

A Two-Tiered Future: Expedited Treatment for Whom?

Recent orders suggest an "expedited DEA registration pathway" for state-licensed cannabis operators-businesses that bypassed the federal pharmaceutical framework entirely. This raises a visceral question for the upcoming hearing: Will the same Diversion Control Division that invented a "Catch-22" against MMJ suddenly find the institutional capacity to move expeditiously for state-market operators? If so, the DEA's history with MMJ serves as a definitive blueprint for ongoing regulatory discrimination.

The Accounting Begins: June 22 and June 29

For the patients who lost 2,500 days, there is no recovery. Families who watched loved ones decline while federally authorized science was held hostage cannot reclaim that time.

On June 22, Administrator Terrance Cole must decide who receives a seat at the table for the June 29 hearing. This selection will determine if the DEA remains a place of secrecy and obstruction or if it is finally ready to embrace the science it has suppressed. Whether MMJ is included or excluded, the DEA cannot hide. If excluded, the D.C. Circuit awaits, where constitutional challenges and APA violations will be litigated on the merits. If included, the questions regarding 2,500 days of obstruction will be entered into the public record under oath.

The slow walk is over. The accounting has begun.

MMJ International Holdings, MMJ BioPharma Cultivation, and MMJ BioPharma Labs are represented by counsel in all pending federal proceedings, including the DEA rescheduling hearing participation, the D.C. Circuit appeal of Judge McFadden's BEI dismissal, and all related constitutional and administrative law challenges forthcoming.

CONTACT:
Madison Hisey
[email protected]
203-231-8583

SOURCE: MMJ International Holdings

View the original press release on ACCESS Newswire

W.Stewart--AT