After the Election: Cannabis reform turns to access and implementation
The 2026 election created new opportunities for cannabis reform, but the industry’s next challenge will be turning those opportunities into regulated access, workable business environments, and relief for people still affected by prohibition.
For Rodney Holcombe, Vice President of Corporate Affairs at LeafLink, the results represent an opening for work that extends from Congress and state legislatures to city halls and individual businesses.
Speaking with Greenway, Holcombe described a cannabis policy landscape in which questions about commerce, public health, criminal justice, and individual freedom increasingly overlap.
“This is business, this is environmental justice, this is criminal justice reform,” Holcombe said. “It touches so much. There’s labor implications.
“There’s a lot here. And I think what we saw as once a pretty fringe issue has now garnered bipartisan support.”
That breadth helps explain why cannabis reform can draw support from people who disagree on other political questions. It also creates a more complicated task after an election.
Supporting legalization is one decision.
Determining who can participate, where consumers can purchase products, how businesses are taxed, and what happens to past convictions requires sustained attention.
Missouri offers a familiar example. Voters approved both medical marijuana and adult-use legalization through the initiative process in a red state governed by a supermajority of Republicans for over a decade.
The experience illustrates how support for cannabis can cross party lines while leaving substantial debate about the rules that govern it.
Voters protect existing access and a path to reform
Two statewide measures illustrated different aspects of that conversation.
In Massachusetts, voters rejected Question 8, which would have ended the state’s regulated adult-use cannabis market and home cultivation while preserving medical cannabis. Unofficial results showed approximately 76% voting against the proposal.
In Idaho, approximately 66% of voters rejected HJR 4, a proposed constitutional amendment that would have reserved the power to legalize marijuana and certain other substances exclusively to the Legislature, removing that option from the citizen initiative process.
“Voters want to maintain their rights to legalize a substance as they see fit,” Holcombe said. “And perhaps that does signal that maybe we do see an initiative introduced in Idaho in the future.
“That maybe does draw the support of consumers who are ultimately wanting a regulated market with the infrastructure needed to purchase products that they can trust.”
The votes addressed different policies. Massachusetts voters retained an operating market. Idaho voters preserved their ability to pursue future changes through ballot initiatives. The results send a similar message.
He viewed both outcomes as encouraging signs for reform.
“I think what this week has shown us is that consumers want cannabis,” he continued. “In fact, in Massachusetts, they voted against this measure in a way that exceeded the measure to actually legalize cannabis in the first place in the state of Massachusetts.”
For an established market, the question becomes whether consumers see enough value in the system to defend it. For a state without a legal program, it may begin with preserving the ability to have that debate at all.
Access is also a local question
Statewide legalization does not settle where cannabis businesses can operate or how easily consumers can reach them.
Holcombe pointed to local decisions about retail access, business prohibitions, and taxes as an important part of the industry’s development. LeafLink’s election guide tracked measures across multiple states, including proposals to allow businesses, change license limits, and revise local taxes. The outcomes varied, and some measures were advisory or contingent on other approvals.
“As most folks know, there are opt-outs in most jurisdictions where basically there can be no cannabis sales. So there’s no retail footprint, there’s just really nowhere to purchase it,” Holcombe said.
“I think it’s important that we are looking at that local level in addition to the state level, because that is where a lot of the action to create access and to expand programs actually sits,” Holcombe explained.
The practical distinction matters.
A legal market must give consumers a reason and a realistic opportunity to use it.
Geographic access, product availability, and the cost of doing business all shape whether a program can serve the people it was created to reach.
Houston offered a different example of local reform.
Voters approved Proposition A, a charter amendment directing the Houston Police Department to make Class A and Class B misdemeanor marijuana possession its lowest enforcement priority. The measure changes local enforcement policy without legalizing adult-use cannabis under Texas law.
For Holcombe, who is from Houston, the result also spoke to the reasons many people entered cannabis advocacy in the first place.
“It’s a signal that Houston voters do not want to see people arrested and locked up for cannabis law violations,” he said. “And that, for me and for many people who have come to this industry, means a lot because we wanted to see cannabis prohibition end.
“That means getting people out of jail and prison, Black and brown people especially, who are overcriminalized still in this legalization era.”
New political openings, different market decisions
Changes in state leadership could create opportunities beyond the measures that directly mentioned cannabis.
Democrats won control of the governor’s office and both legislative chambers in both Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.
That “power triangle” led Holcombe to identify the two states as markets to watch, with different starting points.
Those incoming governing majorities create opportunities for legislation, though the elections themselves did not establish new cannabis programs.
Pennsylvania already has a successful and established medical cannabis industry.
Holcombe sees potential for expansion and explained the debate now includes how an adult-use market would be structured, whether retail would operate through private businesses or a state-controlled model, and how new participants enter the supply chain.
“I think the real question that emerges now is whether that sort of approach is the one that Pennsylvania tends to take here, or do they decide, let’s have a private market, let’s flip this medical market over to adult use and introduce more licenses across the supply chain so that we have new entrants that hadn’t been in the market before.”
He described an opportunity to build on the medical market while introducing additional licenses and creating space for businesses and individuals that have not previously participated.
“We have opportunity for both social equity and social justice. We can create more of a footprint so that more Pennsylvanians are starting to purchase from the regulated market.”
Wisconsin, by comparison, would be building from the ground up.
Holcombe said lawmakers could consider a medical program first or pursue medical and adult-use legalization together.
“The difference, of course, is that they don’t have an established medical market,” he said. “So maybe they decide let’s do medical first, then we do adult use.”
In both cases, the details will determine how political support translates into access and business opportunity. A legislative majority can create a path for a bill, but lawmakers still have to agree on the market they intend to build.
Federal reform adds another layer
Federal policy creates an additional set of decisions for states considering new programs and businesses operating under existing ones.
The Justice Department’s medical marijuana order applies to qualifying medical activities, while marijuana outside its scope remains under Schedule I. The broader rescheduling proposal is proceeding separately.
The department reiterated those distinctions in its October 30 announcement about federal registrations for qualifying medical marijuana dispensaries.
That distinction is especially relevant to businesses serving both medical patients and adult-use consumers, Holcombe said.
He described uncertainty about how federal requirements will interact with those operations and called for completion and clarity of the broader rescheduling process and federal reform as legislative priorities.
“I think really it’s getting done with the rescheduling process and making sure that that is settled so that folks are not having to come up against this wall where it’s like, ‘Oh, do I have to split my business in half?”
Holcombe said he generally expects states to continue pursuing reform while considering how federal developments could affect the markets they create.
“I think we’re still waiting on some outcomes, but I think states, in my estimation, are probably not going to necessarily slow down.
“I think they’re still going to want to deliver on these reforms with an eye for what could be happening at the federal level and how that may impact the market that they seek to create.”
In states without medical programs, he suggested federal movement could give lawmakers additional support for taking action.
“I think that maybe even empowers state lawmakers to move forward.”
The work continues after passage
For Holcombe, passing a law begins an ongoing process of implementation, review, and adjustment.
“In fact, it actually gets harder when implementation is the reality of the day, right?” he explained.
“It’s like you’re going to have to be building a plane as you fly it because often you’re gonna see problems that you never saw before, even though there are states to draw examples from.”
To create a stronger relationship between operators and regulators, Holcombe called for regular review of regulations, conversations with business owners and communities, and legislative changes when programs fail to work as intended.
“The legislature should go back and they should pass a package to amend the program as needed. We should have reviews of regulation at an average or regular pace.
“We should also constantly be surveying business owners in the community to make sure, ‘Is this working as we thought it should?’ And if we’re doing that, we can make fixes that ultimately make this as workable as possible.”
That review also needs to include people whose convictions and sentences remain affected by prohibition Holcombe said.
He told Greenway that he began his career at the Drug Policy Alliance, and emphasized that criminal justice reform requires attention beyond the creation of business licenses or the opening of dispensaries.
The scope of record relief matters, he stated, including whether reforms address cultivation and distribution-related convictions as well as simple possession.
“I think that is where the advocacy has to continue even after we see some measure passed or after we see a program be fully implemented,” Holcombe said. “It’s like, ‘Okay, all the licenses are stood up, but have we done the things we’re supposed to do here?’ And often the answer is no. And so we have to keep going back.”
For businesses, patients, consumers, and advocates, the period before a new legislative session is also an opportunity to build relationships.
Incoming officials will be deciding which issues to prioritize and which proposals to introduce. Specific examples of what works, what creates barriers, and what needs to change can help inform those decisions.
“I think that speaks to the point of this just never stopping and that there will be a need to continue legislative and regulatory advocacy well after the reform passes,” Holcombe continued. “Because, the truth here is that you do have lawmakers that are deciding these issues who, frankly, this is one of 1,000 things they’re thinking about. And I hate to make the case that this isn’t a top priority for them, but in many instances it is not.”
Holcombe encouraged operators to invite lawmakers into their businesses and explain how the rules function in practice.
“Everyone should be going to their lawmakers and inviting them to their business,” he said. “Show them your facility, show them your dispensary, go and talk to them about the issues of the day.”
