Ask a room full of people whether cannabis is legal in the United States right now, and you will get a confident yes from more than half of them. Ask them why, and you will hear some version of the same answer: the President took care of it.
He did not. And the gap between what people believe happened and what actually happened is one of the more revealing problems facing this industry — because it tells you exactly how thin public understanding still is, even at a moment when infused products are sitting in coolers at the corner liquor store.
That gap was the throughline of a recent conversation on NCIA's Voice of Cannabis podcast, where host Jimmy Young sat down with Kasey Kollross — a 30-year cannabis consumer and advocate, a new member of the National Cannabis Industry Association's Board of Directors, and, alongside his wife Leah, part of the story behind 23rd State. What started as a policy check-in turned into something more useful: a working theory of how this plant actually becomes part of everyday American life, and why beverages are quietly doing more of that work than any bill in Congress.
Here is the accurate version of where things stand, and what it means for anyone holding a can.
The Short Answer: No, Cannabis Is Not Federally Legal
Let's put the facts on the table, because precision matters here more than opinion.
In late 2025, an executive order directed federal agencies to move the rescheduling process forward as expeditiously as the law allows. That created headlines. It did not create legalization.
What followed in April 2026 was narrower than most coverage suggested. The Department of Justice issued a final order moving two specific categories from Schedule I to Schedule III of the Controlled Substances Act: marijuana contained in an FDA-approved drug product, and marijuana subject to a state medical marijuana license. That order took effect in late April 2026.
Everything else stayed put. Adult-use cannabis in legal states — the dispensary market, the operators, the products most consumers actually encounter — remained a Schedule I substance. Section 280E, the tax provision that has strangled cannabis businesses for years, continued to apply to those operators. A separate, expedited DEA administrative hearing on whether cannabis more broadly should move to Schedule III was held in the summer of 2026, and any resulting final rule can be challenged in court.
So the honest summary is this: a narrow slice of cannabis was rescheduled. Cannabis was not legalized. And rescheduling is not legalization in the first place. Schedule III is still a controlled substance classification. Alcohol is not scheduled at all.
You can track the federal record directly through the DEA's marijuana rescheduling regulatory actions page and the Federal Register docket for the proceeding. If you want the earlier context on what the initial announcement did and didn't promise, we covered that when it broke in our piece on what the Schedule III move means for the industry.
Why so many people got it wrong
Kollross's reaction on the podcast was blunt: it is genuinely startling how many people believe this is a done deal. Not casual observers, either — people with real proximity to the industry.
That is not a stupidity problem. It is an information-environment problem. Major announcements get covered loudly; procedural follow-through gets covered quietly or not at all. Most people heard the first headline and never encountered the second. Meanwhile, mainstream media still largely refuses to run positive messaging about cannabis, and the industry itself is restricted from advertising on most major platforms. The result is a public that forms its understanding from fragments.
Which leads to the argument at the heart of the episode.
Normalization, Legalization, and Acceptance Are Three Different Things
Young made a distinction worth borrowing. Legalization, he pointed out, is a process that runs through politicians and lawyers. It is slow, adversarial, reversible, and largely outside any individual's control.
Normalization is different. Normalization is what happens when something stops being remarkable. It is the moment a product becomes an ordinary part of the landscape — stocked where people already shop, served where people already gather, discussed without a lowered voice.
Both hosts came back to a charge that NCIA co-founder Aaron Smith laid down years ago: everyone in this industry has an obligation to advance the normalization of the plant. Not to sell it to people who don't want it — as Young put it, cannabis is not for everyone, and nobody is obligated to use it. But to make sure that the people who are curious can find accurate information instead of a century of recycled rhetoric.
That distinction reframes the entire job. If you're waiting on legalization, you're waiting on Congress. If you're working on normalization, you can start this afternoon.
"Recreational" May Have Done More Harm Than Good
One of the sharper moments in the conversation was a challenge to a word most of us use without thinking.
Young argued that the term recreational has damaged the plant's standing — that it frames cannabis as frivolous and sets up a false wall between medical use and everything else. Kollross agreed, and pushed it further: most use is arguably self-directed care of one kind or another, and finding joy is not a lesser goal than treating a symptom. Easing a hard day, sleeping better, relaxing enough to actually be present with people you like — those are not indulgences sitting outside of wellness. They are wellness.
This matters practically, not just philosophically. The recreational/medical divide encourages a specific consumer behavior: walk in, ask for the strongest thing available, treat the experience as an event rather than a routine. Drop the divide and better questions surface. What am I actually looking for? What gets me there? What amount fits the evening I'm planning?
That shift — from potency-chasing to intention — is the same shift that makes low-dose products make sense to people. It also happens to be the shift that dissolves a lot of stigma, which we've explored in depth in our guide to cannabis stigma and how it shapes wellness choices. If you want to get concrete about it, keeping a simple log of what you consumed and how you actually felt is more useful than any strain chart; our wellness tracking starter guide walks through how to do it without turning it into homework.
Beverages Are the Quiet Engine of Normalization
Here is where the conversation got genuinely interesting for anyone in the drinks category.
Kollross made a point that deserves more attention than it usually gets: adult-use cannabis has very little to fear from hemp, because the consumer bases barely overlap. The person reaching for a low-dose infused beverage is not, generally speaking, the person heading to a dispensary for concentrates. They are different products serving different occasions for different people.
And beverages reach a group that traditional cannabis messaging structurally cannot. Consider the profile: an adult who maybe tried something once in college thirty years ago, who has no interest in smoking anything, who would feel out of place walking into a dispensary, and who has never once sought out cannabis content. No amount of industry messaging finds that person.
But a can in a restaurant cooler does. A tap list at a taproom does. A shelf in the liquor store where they're already buying something similar does. As Kollross put it, meeting people in the places they already are simply makes the most sense.
There's a hard number underneath this, too. Young noted that roughly half of daily cannabis consumers aren't smoking at all — they're using tinctures, edibles, vapes, and beverages. Yet turn on a local news segment about cannabis and the first image on screen is still a burning joint. The picture the public carries around is a generation out of date.
Why the format changes the experience, not just the optics
This isn't only a marketing story. Drinks genuinely behave differently than other formats, which is part of why they work as an entry point.
A beverage is pre-portioned, so the serving decision is made before you open it. It fits a social rhythm people already know — something in your hand, something to sip, something that signals participation without alcohol. And the way an infused drink is absorbed differs meaningfully from a traditional edible, which is why the onset and character of the experience often feel distinct. We broke that chemistry down in THC bioavailability: why drinks hit different than edibles, and if you're new to the category entirely, start with our safe hemp usage guide for beginners.
For a sense of how much thought goes into making an infused drink taste like a drink rather than an experiment, see how we approached FRESH PRESS, our THC-infused pear cider — and why the category vocabulary itself is still being written, which we untangled in what is a THC cider?
Individual results vary, and no beverage is right for everyone. But the format lowers the barrier to trying, and lowering that barrier is precisely what normalization requires.
The Person This Argument Was Built Around
At one point in the episode, the abstract case for non-combustible formats became concrete, because Kollross talked about his wife.
Leah Kollross was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 2023 — the same year Minnesota became the 23rd state to legalize adult-use cannabis. Before the diagnosis, she had never used cannabis in her life. What she had was an ordinary relationship with a glass of wine in the evening, the kind of unremarkable social ritual most adults never think twice about. After the diagnosis, that changed.
And here is the detail that reframes the entire format conversation: she has never consumed a combustible cannabis product. Not once.
For an enormous number of people, that is the whole story. The barrier was never curiosity or willingness — it was that every available on-ramp ran through a product they had no interest in using and a setting they had no interest in entering. When the only door is one you won't walk through, the room may as well not exist.
That is precisely the gap 23rd State was built to close. Leah has written about it directly in her own words, and it's worth reading her account rather than ours: her founder story, how MS led her to reimagine the drink in your hand, published in GreenState, and her piece in High Times on how cannabis beverages are replacing alcohol rituals. We've also shared the longer version on our own blog — the diagnosis that led to 23rd State, and the GreenState feature that followed.
This is also where the "recreational versus medicinal" debate stops being academic. A woman-owned, disability-led beverage brand exists because someone needed a way to still be in the room — at the toast, at the table, at the celebration — without the thing everyone else was holding. Call that recreational and you've missed it entirely. Call it medical and you've also missed it. It's both, and the insistence on sorting it into one bin is exactly the habit the podcast was arguing against.
Joy is part of wellness. That's not a marketing line at 23rd State; it's the founding premise, and it came from lived experience rather than a brand workshop.
Nothing here is a medical claim. Cannabis is not a treatment for multiple sclerosis or any other condition, individual experiences differ substantially, and anyone managing a health condition should talk with their own healthcare provider.
The Minnesota Model: Low-Dose, Licensed, and Ahead of the Curve
Kollross was direct about his home state: Minnesota is a remarkable place to be building around this plant. Two things stand out.
First, the low-dose hemp framework. Minnesota built a regulated market for lower-potency hemp edibles — beverages very much included — years before its adult-use program came online. That gave the state a head start on the exact thing the rest of the country is now arguing about: how to sell modest, clearly labeled, age-gated infused products through ordinary retail channels without the sky falling. Products are licensed through the Minnesota Office of Cannabis Management, with manufacturers, wholesalers, and retailers all subject to state licensing, and sales restricted to adults 21 and older. Consumers can review the state's own summary of what adults may legally possess and use on the OCM adult-use overview.
Second, the equity design. Minnesota gave tribal nations the first real opportunity in the adult-use market, and Kollross was genuinely impressed by what followed — professional operations, high standards, experienced hires from established markets, serious branding. Young framed the significance plainly: the communities hit hardest by the war on drugs are among the first getting a legitimate shot at the legal one.
That's the state we're named for. Minnesota was the 23rd state to legalize adult-use cannabis, and the model it built is now being cited as one other states might follow. You can find our beverages at licensed retailers across the state through our store locator.
Why the Big THC Number Isn't the Point
The conversation eventually landed on a habit familiar to anyone who has worked a retail counter: customers walking in and asking for whatever has the highest THC percentage.
Kollross was candid that the trend persists, and that there's complacency on both sides of the counter — consumers chasing the number, and operators happy to sell against it.
Young's response was the useful part. Potency, he argued, is heavily shaped by the terpenes it's mixed with — the steering currents around it. And once you have even a working knowledge of the endocannabinoid system, the whole "highest number wins" model starts to fall apart, because that system varies from person to person. What works well for you may do very little for someone else. Every mammal has one; no two are identical.
For beverages, this translates into something simple and practical. A 10mg can is not a promise about how you will feel. It is a starting point, and the honest guidance is unchanged: start low, go slow, wait before you reach for a second, and pay attention to your own response rather than someone else's review. If you want the plain-language version of why bodies differ, we wrote the endocannabinoid system explained for exactly that purpose.
And the compliance basics don't move: 21+ only, never before or while driving, and check with a healthcare provider if you take medications or have health concerns. If you're traveling, the rules change at the airport — our 2026 TSA guide for hemp products covers what to know before you pack.
What's Actually at Stake: The November 12 Deadline
Normalization is winning at the cultural level. The legal picture is less settled.
Section 781 of the FY2026 federal appropriations law, signed in November 2025, rewrites the statutory definition of hemp — replacing the delta-9 standard with a total-THC standard and capping finished consumable products at 0.4 milligrams of total THC per container. With a one-year runway built in, those changes are scheduled to take effect November 12, 2026, which would place a large share of the hemp-derived products currently on shelves outside the federal definition of hemp. Legislative fixes and legal challenges are both in motion, and the situation is genuinely fluid.
The practical stakes in Minnesota are concrete: breweries, distributors, retailers, and beverage brands that built compliant businesses under a state framework are the ones exposed. We wrote about that directly in Minnesota's breweries are on the clock.
This is also where the podcast's argument comes back around. Kollross was clear about what he wants to champion in his NCIA role: not hemp versus adult-use, not legacy versus legal, but one plant and one industry with shared interests. When the rhetoric turns hostile, division is the vulnerability.
How to Actually Participate in Normalization
If the takeaway from the episode is that everyone in and around this industry is now an educator, here's what that looks like in practice:
- Correct the rescheduling myth when you hear it. Cannabis was not legalized. A narrow category was rescheduled, and rescheduling is not legalization. Getting this right in casual conversation is a small act with outsized value.
- Retire "recreational" where you can. Try describing what you're actually after — unwinding, socializing, sleeping better, enjoying the evening. Precision beats a loaded category.
- Lead with format, not potency. For someone curious and cautious, the useful information is what the experience is like and how much is in it, not what number is printed largest.
- Normalize the setting. A THC beverage at a dinner party, offered the same way you'd offer anything else, does more for public understanding than any advertisement could.
- Stay current on policy. Federal and state rules are both moving. Verify before you assume — including anything in this article, which reflects the picture as of publication.
Frequently Asked Questions
Did President Trump legalize cannabis? No. Cannabis has not been legalized federally. In April 2026, the Department of Justice issued an order moving two narrow categories — marijuana in an FDA-approved drug product, and marijuana under a state medical marijuana license — from Schedule I to Schedule III. All other cannabis, including adult-use cannabis in legal states, remained in Schedule I pending a separate rulemaking process.
Is cannabis still a Schedule I controlled substance in 2026? For most purposes, yes. Outside FDA-approved drug products and state-licensed medical cannabis, cannabis remained Schedule I as of mid-2026. A DEA administrative hearing on broader rescheduling was held in summer 2026; any change requires a final rule that may still face legal challenge.
What's the difference between legalization and normalization? Legalization is a change in law, driven by legislators, regulators, and courts. Normalization is a cultural shift in which something becomes an unremarkable part of daily life. Normalization often moves faster, and it's driven by education rather than legislation.
Why do THC beverages reach people who'd never visit a dispensary? Format and setting. A can fits contexts people already understand — a restaurant, a cooler at the liquor store, a backyard gathering — and requires no new ritual or equipment. Many adults who'd never use a combustible product will try a low-dose drink because it resembles something familiar.
Does a higher THC number mean a better product? Not necessarily. Potency is one data point. The full chemical profile, the format and how it's absorbed, and your own endocannabinoid system all shape the experience. Two people can consume the same amount and describe very different results — which is why starting low and going slow is standard guidance.
What is Section 781 and why does November 12, 2026 matter? Section 781 narrows the federal definition of hemp, moving to a total-THC standard and capping finished consumables at 0.4mg of total THC per container. Signed in November 2025 with a one-year runway, it's scheduled to take effect November 12, 2026, which would place many current products outside the federal hemp definition. Legislative and legal efforts to modify or delay it remain ongoing.
Why was 23rd State founded? 23rd State was founded by Leah Kollross in 2023, the same year Minnesota became the 23rd state to legalize adult-use cannabis. Diagnosed with multiple sclerosis that year, she has spoken publicly about needing a social beverage option that didn't yet exist — she had never used a combustible cannabis product. The brand is woman-owned and disability-led, built on the premise that joy and celebration are part of wellness, not separate from it.
Are hemp-derived THC beverages legal in Minnesota? Minnesota regulates lower-potency hemp edibles, including beverages, through the Office of Cannabis Management, with licensing for manufacturers, wholesalers, and retailers, and sales restricted to adults 21 and older. Rules continue to evolve at both the state and federal level — confirm current requirements directly with OCM.
The Work Is the Education
The most durable idea from the episode isn't a policy prediction. It's that the plant's future rests less on any single vote than on whether ordinary people understand what they're looking at.
That's a slower project than a headline, and a more reliable one. Every accurate conversation, every correctly labeled product, every adult who tries a 10mg beverage at a dinner party and thinks oh — that's it? moves the needle a little further than the last one.
We built 23rd State around that premise, and around one person's need for a drink that let her stay in the room. Minnesota was the 23rd state to legalize adult-use cannabis, and we've spent the time since making beverages that fit into normal life instead of standing apart from it. If you want to see what that looks like in a glass, explore our THC beverages, read the story behind the brand, or dig into the real-world study data behind how people actually use them.
Want the full conversation? Watch Kasey Kollross on NCIA's Voice of Cannabis podcast with host Jimmy Young, or browse the full podcast archive at NCIA.
For adults 21+ only. These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. Do not drive or operate machinery after consuming. Consult a healthcare provider before use, particularly if you are pregnant, nursing, or taking medications. Individual results vary. Federal and state regulations described here reflect publicly available information as of July 2026 and are subject to change; verify current requirements with the appropriate regulatory authority.
