INDIANAPOLIS– Despite a record amount of marijuana bills filed by both Indiana Republicans and Democrats this legislative session, all efforts to legalize and decriminalize weed failed.
”This is really just not a priority for people; it’s also not a priority for the leaders of Indiana,” said Jaime Zerbe with Smart Approaches to Marijuana (SAM). SAM has pushed for marijuana decriminalization efforts but strictly opposes legalization efforts.
Weeks after the Republican-led coalition Safe and Regulated Indiana pushed for meaningful marijuana reform, the main bill they pushed for died. According to an LSA fiscal analysis, that bill could have brought up to $200 million in new revenue to Indiana in 2026.
”As great as Indiana’s been fiscally, there’s always challenges, right? You know, education always needs more money, infrastructure needs more money, law enforcement, public safety,” said Joe Elsener with Safe and Regulated Indiana.
A historic hearing to decriminalize marijuana also took place but that bill died in committee.
”We did have a lot more bipartisan support across the board, and that was really important to see,” said Lucy Luman with Indiana NORML.
Heading into this session, Republican Leadership warned they’d seen no compelling cases for legalizing marijuana.
“There’s always the next year,” Indiana House Speaker Todd Huston said. ”I don’t believe in doing…policy based upon revenue. I think you do good public policy and you deal with the revenue, and that’s the way I feel about the marijuana issue.”
Elsener said despite what’s happened this session, 30,000 people have joined their coalition in the last four months.
”We actually have a lot of momentum,” said Elsener. ”Obviously, we’re not getting what we want this legislative session, but I’m really excited about the progress.”
One bill that did pass would set a THC limit to determine if a driver was under the influence.
”That’s an important hurdle to this conversation, and so that’s actually a big win to see that continue to move forward,” Elsener said.
Indiana House Minority Leader Phil GiaQuinta said his caucus will still pursue other avenues this session to legalize medical marijuana. Medical marijuana was a huge talking point heading into this legislative session—in large part due to Gov. Braun expressing openness to legalizing medical cannabis.
”We’ll keep trying, I mean, we have a whole second half,” GiaQuinta said. “There’s an amendment process, too, that we can always, if there’s an opportunity we’ll do that because our caucus is in full support of that.”
As for the THC threshold bill, that was referred to the Senate. It has yet to receive an initial reading there and get passed onto committee.