Advocates for marijuana legalization in Indiana already know 2026 won’t be the year they see it happen.
Despite President Donald Trump signing an executive order in December for reclassifying marijuana as a less-dangerous drug, the Republican-dominated state Legislature isn’t acting on any bills that would allow medical or recreational use.
Instead, legislators are advancing proposals that would tighten state laws on delta-8 products with THC — the active ingredient in marijuana — and crack down on advertisements for marijuana dispensaries in neighboring states.
The stance has one marijuana legalization advocate arguing that Indiana officials are “sticking their head in the sand.”
Trump stance hasn’t shifted Indiana status
Indiana is among only 10 states that don’t allow either medicinal and recreational marijuana sales.
Legalization supporters made a prominent push going into the 2025 legislative session but were unable to persuade lawmakers to take any action on the issue.
Trump’s executive order in December to shift cannabis from its current Schedule I status, alongside drugs such as heroin and LSD, to the less-regulated Schedule III level would seem to weaken a long-standing argument from top state Republicans against legalization.
But that did not result in removing any Statehouse hurdles to marijuana bills or a renewed visible campaign from advocates.
Joe Elsener, a former Marion County Republican chair and an organizer of the lobbying group Safe and Regulated Indiana, said part of that was strategic rather than trying to push major changes during the Legislature’s two-month short session this year.
“I think President Trump’s announcement before the holidays is just another big sign that the way people are thinking about this,” Elsener said. “Just in general, the country is moving in a different direction.”
The expected federal change hasn’t altered the anti-legalization stance of top Republican legislative leaders, who’ve long cited the Schedule I classification and concerns about societal impacts in states that allow marijuana sales.
Senate President Pro Tem Rodric Bray told reporters this past week that Trump’s reclassification order was “to try to move that along.”
“It didn’t actually affect the change or make the change. We’re continuing those conversations,” Bray said of possible legalization. “I don’t have much new.”
That continued opposition led legalization advocate Heath VanNatter, R-Kokomo, to decide against filing marijuana legislation this year since House rules allowed him to submit only five bills for the short session.
“It’s not going to happen this year,” VanNatter told the Indiana Capital Chronicle. “I wasn’t going to waste a bill slot for a bill that I knew wasn’t going to move.”
VanNatter said he believed the federal reclassification could lead to Indiana removing criminal penalties over marijuana possession even if resistance remains to legalization.
“If that ends up going through, then it will certainly make it better, easier for us to do it here,” he said.
Since a February 2023 hearing on a VanNatter-sponsored decriminalization bill, no state legislative committees have taken up proposals pulling back on Indiana’s marijuana laws.
House Courts and Criminal Code Committee Chair Rep. Wendy McNamara, R-Evansville, didn’t take a vote on that 2023 bill and hasn’t considered the issue since then.
“As long as it’s illegal on the federal level, there’s really no reason for us to act on the state level,” McNamara said in an interview last week.
Advocates looking for Braun action
Some legalization supporters are still trying to encourage some steps, looking to seize upon Gov. Mike Braun’s statements that he’s willing to consider allowing medical-use sales.
Jeff Staker, the leader of Hoosier Veterans for Medical Cannabis, met in January with state Business Affairs Secretary Mike Speedy to encourage the establishment of a state cannabis commission.
“If we can get that, I think we’ll have a groundwork for developing policies on medical cannabis here in Indiana,” Staker said in an interview.
Staker, 60, is a former Marine Corps drill instructor and a retired Grissom Air Reserve Base firefighter. He said he organized the cannabis group in 2016 after exploring medical options other than taking the painkiller oxycontin for a back injury.
He said many military veterans want to have the legal option of using marijuana to relieve injuries or the impact of post-traumatic stress disorder, and expressed frustration with the lack of Statehouse action.
“They’re sticking their head in the sand, again,” he said. “But, obviously, with Trump’s executive order for the rescheduling, the state’s going to have to do something.”
Braun has not taken any such action and the governor’s office did not make any administration officials available to the Capital Chronicle for an interview about marijuana policy.
The federal reclassification would further isolate Indiana’s anti-marijuana laws, especially with Illinois, Michigan and Ohio allowing sales to all adults and Kentucky having a medical-use program, Staker said.
“There’s a lot of our state legislators that are very supportive of this,” he said. “They’ve been waiting for the feds to do exactly what they did. It’s just that the governor has to take a stronger approach.”
Legislators pushing tighter laws
The action during this year’s legislative session, however, has been for clamping down on marijuana-related matters.
The Senate last week endorsed a ban on intoxicating and synthetic hemp-derived products — echoing a recent federal law designed to close a “loophole” that has allowed potent products with delta-8, THC and other cannabinoids to proliferate.
Senate Bill 250 now moves on to the House for further action.
The bill sponsored by Sen. Aaron Freeman, R-Indianapolis would ban THC-product sales along with banning sales or advertising within 1,000 feet of schools or playgrounds.
Another provision would prevent state law from immediately reflecting federal reclassification of marijuana, if that goes through.
“This bill simply says that we would not automatically follow what the federal government does, that we would decide, 150 of us — that we would make that decision, not the federal government for us,” Freeman said of Indiana Senate and House members.
Yet another bill aims to remove billboards promoting marijuana shops that line many roadways near Indiana’s borders.
Legislation advanced last year by Rep. Jim Pressel, R-Rolling Prairie, banned the advertising of illegal products, including billboards and mailed fliers for Michigan marijuana dispensaries that he said were inundating his northern Indiana district.
Pressel said some marijuana businesses took advantage of that law’s July 1, 2025, effective date to sign long-term contracts on billboards to avoid the ban.
Language in House Bill 1200 that he’s sponsoring this year would force removal of all such marijuana advertising by July 1, 2026. The House is expected this week to advance the bill to the Senate for consideration.
Pressel said allowing marijuana advertising sends a mixed message to the public.
“If you see the billboard out there and they’re advertising for marijuana, they are under the impression that maybe the General Assembly passed this, maybe it’s legal now, and it’s not,” Pressel said. “This is not a conversation, again, about whether marijuana should be legal or not. This is a conversation about, ‘Should we allow a company to advertise a criminal activity in the state of Indiana?’”
Indiana Capital Chronicle is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Indiana Capital Chronicle maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Niki Kelly for questions: info@indianacapitalchronicle.com.
