SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
For Immediate Release
October, 05 2012, 02:23pm EDT
Contact:
ASA Media Liaison Kris Hermes 510-681-6361 or ASA Chief Counsel Joe Elford 415-573-7842
Medical Marijuana Lawsuit Reviewing Scientific Evidence Reaches Federal Court for First Time in Nearly 20 Years
Audiotape of yesterday's teleconference briefing with researchers, legal counsel and lawsuit plaintiff now available
WASHINGTON
For the first time in nearly 20 years, a United States Court of Appeals is set to hear oral arguments in a lawsuit challenging the federal government's classification of marijuana as a dangerous drug with no medicinal value: Americans for Safe Access v. Drug Enforcement Administration. This historic case will force a federal court to finally review the scientific evidence regarding the therapeutic efficacy of marijuana.
During a press briefing Thursday, plaintiffs in the case, along with leading medical researchers and clinicians, spoke about the necessity of the federal government recognizing current scientific data supporting marijuana rescheduling. Marijuana is currently classified in the same category as heroin despite calls from scientists, medical professionals, and policy makers to reschedule marijuana for medical use.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit will hear opening arguments on the case the morning of October 16, 2012. "Medical marijuana patients are finally getting their day in court," said Joe Elford, Chief Counsel with Americans for Safe Access (ASA), who will be arguing the case before the D.C. Circuit. "What's at stake in this case is nothing less than our country's scientific integrity and the imminent needs of millions of patients."
On the call, Dr. Donald Abrams, Director of Clinical Programs at San Francisco General Hospital, described the effectiveness of medical marijuana in the treatment regimens of cancer and HIV/AIDS patients. "In my practice every day as a cancer specialist I see patients who have loss of appetite, nausea and vomiting from their chemotherapy, pain on and off of opiates, anxiety, depression, and insomnia," conditions which Dr. Abrams said can be alleviated by medical marijuana.
Dr. Igor Grant, Executive Vice-Chair, Department of Psychiatry, University of California-San Diego School of Medicine, and director of the Center for Medicinal Cannabis Research, stated that multiple California state-supported studies have resulted in "very good evidence" that medical marijuana "is effective in treating muscle spasticity," which is often experienced by patients with Multiple sclerosis and other painful disorders. He added that it is critical to separate out patients' legitimate medical needs from other issues surrounding marijuana's distribution and usage. Dr. Grant recently published a study in Open Neurology Journal concluding that marijuana's current classification is "untenable."
Plaintiff Michael Krawitz, a Gulf War veteran and medical marijuana patient, conveyed his struggle in managing his combat-related pain without relinquishing federally-mandated VA benefits under marijuana's current classification. Without access to medical marijuana, he stated he is in danger of destabilizing his overall health condition, a situation Krawitz has faced multiple times due to federal policy.
Steph Sherer, ASA's Executive Director, ended the call by noting that the rescheduling case coincides with the organization's 10th anniversary of its founding, which will be marked by an event the night of October 16th honoring individuals, including numerous elected officials, who have led the fight for patient access.
"The time has come to address medical marijuana as a public health issue and for the federal government to prioritize science over politics," Sherer said.
Further information:
Audio recording of Thursday's teleconference briefing on the rescheduling case: https://snd.sc/OHKSoR
Details of ASA's 10th anniversary dinner on October 16th: https://AmericansForSafeAccess.org/oct16-dinner
Americans for Safe Access is the nation's largest organization of patients, medical professionals, scientists and concerned citizens promoting safe and legal access to cannabis for therapeutic use and research.
LATEST NEWS
‘Disgusting’: Trump’s Top Economic Adviser Brags About Killing 300,000 Americans' ‘High-Paying’ Jobs
"Everybody is hurt by what he's celebrating," one public employee union official told Common Dreams. "I guess it's just par for the course from this administration, but it's still a disgusting thing to hear."
Apr 10, 2026
President Donald Trump's top economic adviser boasted on Fox Business Thursday that the government had slashed more than 300,000 "high-paying" jobs from the federal payroll during the president's first year back in office.
Asked by anchor Maria Bartiromo about the administration's efforts to cut government spending, National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett said it had made "a huge amount of progress."
"I think the biggest thing that we can point to is that we've cut government employment by 300,000 workers," he said. "Those are jobs that are very high-paying that are gone forever."
He claimed the cuts reduced government spending by "an unthinkable amount of money," perhaps $1 trillion over the next ten years.
He also said that the administration "reduced the deficit last year by $600 billion" through a combination of higher-than-expected economic growth, tariff revenues, and "supply side effects" of Trump's massive tax cut, which mostly benefited the wealthiest Americans while gutting the social safety net.
Dean Baker, a longtime collaborator of Hassett’s despite their opposing political beliefs, wrote on social media that Trump’s economic adviser was dramatically exaggerating the deficit reduction that occurred during the administration's first year.
According to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), the deficit was about $1.8 trillion for fiscal year 2025, just $41 billion less than the previous year and $56 billion lower than the $1.9 trillion deficit CBO projected in its most recent baseline.
"In the real world, the deficit fell... less than one-tenth of what Kevin claims," Baker said.
Trump has touted the layoffs of hundreds of thousands of government employees from their "boring federal jobs" as one of his crowning achievements.
Among the agencies hit by mass layoffs were the Department of Veterans Affairs, where more than 12,700 employees got the axe; the Department of Health and Human Services, which lost more than 14,400 workers; the Social Security Administration, whose staff shrank by more than 6,600; and the Environmental Protection Agency, which lost more than 4,000 employees.
Jacqueline Simon, policy director at the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), the largest labor union representing federal workers, told Common Dreams that even if slashing jobs did reduce the deficit as Hassett claimed, the harm far outweighs any such benefit—not only for the fired employees, but for the millions of Americans who depend on services they provide.
"When you say 300,000 jobs, it is a nice round number, and you link it to deficit reduction, which he was lying about," Simon said. "The fact of the matter is, the disappearance of those 300,000 jobs means degraded healthcare for our veterans; slower or nonexistent service at the Social Security Administration for the elderly and disabled who rely on Social Security for their income; and the elimination of huge swaths of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) that help ensure we have clean air to breathe and clean water to drink."
"You have federal prisons absolutely overwhelmed by too many inmates and too few corrections officers, endangering public safety," she continued. "Consumer product safety has been eviscerated. There are also serious public health concerns involving substance abuse, childhood nutrition, and vaccinations."
She decried Hassett's comments as "ignorant" in light of his false claims about deficit reduction, but also "just demonstrably pretty cruel and disdainful" given the impact these job losses have on individuals, families, communities, and society as a whole.
"It's cruel," Simon said, "not only on the people who held those jobs—about a 100,000 of whom are military veterans—but the impact of the disappearance of those jobs also falls on children, the elderly, anybody who consumes agricultural products, breathes air, or relies on clean water."
"Everybody is hurt by what he's celebrating," she added. "I guess it's just par for the course from this administration, but it's still a disgusting thing to hear."
Keep ReadingShow Less
‘America’s Not OK’: Surveys Show US Wellbeing in Steep Decline Under Trump
"Americans are drowning under rising costs, flat wages, high unemployment, and historic layoffs—it’s no wonder they’re concerned about how they’re going to make ends meet."
Apr 10, 2026
Two recently released surveys revealed a significant drop in Americans' self-reported wellbeing as the Trump administration launches illegal and deadly military conflicts and plunges the global economy into chaos.
On Friday, the University of Michigan issued its monthly Survey of Consumers, which showed that consumer sentiment in the US hit an all-time low after dropping by 11% since March, amid President Donald Trump's war of choice in Iran.
The drop in consumer sentiment was almost universal, the survey found, as "demographic groups across age, income, and political party all posted setbacks in sentiment, as did every component of the index, reflecting the widespread nature of this month’s fall."
As for the reasons for the decline, the survey found "many consumers blame the Iran conflict for unfavorable changes to the economy," such as a major spike in gas prices, which the US Bureau of Labor Statistics reported on Friday increased by more than 20% in the month since the war began.
Heather Long, chief economist at Navy Federal Credit Union, noted that the latest consumer sentiment data showed Americans are even more sour on the economy now than they were in the summer of 2022, when the economy was dealing with the highest inflation it had seen in decades.
Kendall Witmer, rapid response director of the Democratic National Committee, seized on the consumer sentiment report and accused Trump of having "tanked the economy for working families."
"Americans are drowning under rising costs, flat wages, high unemployment, and historic layoffs," Witmer added. "It's no wonder they're concerned about how they’re going to make ends meet and Trump and [Vice President] JD Vance can’t be bothered to make life more affordable for them."
The record low in consumer sentiment comes just weeks after Gallup released its annual World Happiness Report, which showed that the US had fallen out of its rankings of the 20 happiest countries in the world.
The report says the decrease in US happiness largely came from "lower life evaluations among young adults," and points the finger at high social media use as a key factor in making young people miserable.
Specifically, the report finds "there is now overwhelming evidence of severe and widespread direct harms (such as sextortion and cyberbullying), and compelling evidence of troubling indirect harms (such as depression and anxiety)" from social media use, adding that "the harms and risks to individual users are so diverse and vast in scope that they justify the view that social media is causing harm at a population level."
Social media's impact on mental health has come into focus in recent weeks with juries in multiple states finding Big Tech companies liable for creating products that harm children.
In March, a New Mexico jury found social media giant Meta liable for harming children's mental health and safety, ordering the company to pay $375 million. A day later, a Los Angeles jury ordered Meta and Google to each pay $3 million in civil damages to a now-20-year-old woman who alleged harm and suffering caused by their products when she was an adolescent.
Journalist Derek Thompson took stock of the Gallup survey and the University of Michigan survey, as well as last year's General Social Survey that also documented a decline in US happiness, and declared, "America is not OK."
Keep ReadingShow Less
In Latest Rebuke of Trump and Hegseth, Pope Says 'God Does Not Bless Any Conflict'
"Anyone who is a disciple of Christ, the Prince of Peace, is never on the side of those who once wielded the sword and today drop bombs."
Apr 10, 2026
Pope Leo XIV on Friday vehemently rejected the notion that "God" endorses any war in remarks many interpreted as an implicit rebuke of President Donald Trump, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, and others who claim that the Christian deity figure supports the illegal US-Israeli war of choice against Iran.
"God does not bless any conflict. Anyone who is a disciple of Christ, the Prince of Peace, is never on the side of those who once wielded the sword and today drop bombs," the pope said on X. "Military action will not create space for freedom or timees of peace, which comes only from the patient promotion of coexistence and dialogue among peoples."
"Absurd and inhuman violence is spreading ferociously through the sacred places of the Christian East, profaned by the blasphemy of war and the brutality of business, with no regard for people’s lives, which are considered at most collateral damage of self-interest," the American pontiff added. "But no gain can be worth the life of the weakest, children, or families. No cause can justify the shedding of innocent blood."
This, after the pope responded to Trump's genocidal threat to destroy Iran's civilization by urging "all the people of goodwill to search always for peace, and not violence, to reject war, especially a war which many people have said is an unjust war."
Responding to President Trump’s threat that “a whole civilisation will die tonight”, Pope Leo XIV calls for peace, says “let's remember, especially the innocent children, the elderly, sick. So many people who have already become, or will become victims of this continued warfare,… pic.twitter.com/2LygUzjuC6
— Catholic Sat (@CatholicSat) April 7, 2026
The pope's latest remarks also followed Trump's assertion that God supports the US-Israeli war on Iran and the claim by Hegseth, a Christian nationalist, that American airstrikes on Iran—which have killed more than 2,000 people including hundreds of children—are being "carried out under the protection of divine providence."
Pope Leo used his Palm Sunday sermon to take what many observers interpreted as a swipe at Hegseth after the self-styled secretary of war publicly prayed that God "trains my hands for war and my fingers for battle."
“This is our God: Jesus, King of Peace, who rejects war, whom no one can use to justify war,” the pope said. “He does not listen to the prayers of those who wage war, but rejects them.”
The pontiff also criticized the Trump administration ahead of its brief invasion of Venezuela and kidnapping of its president, Nicolás Maduro, and his wife in January.
The pope's latest comments came on the heels of reporting that a senior Pentagon official bullied Cardinal Christophe Pierre, the Vatican’s US diplomatic representative, telling him that the United States “has the military power to do whatever it wants in the world," and that "the Catholic Church had better take its side."
Another Pentagon official allegedly mentioned the Avignon Papacy, a period in the 14th century when popes resided in France and were essentially controlled by the French monarch—a reference some Vatican officials reportedly took as a threat.
Did…the Trump regime lowkey threaten to kill the pope?
[image or embed]
— Max Berger (@maxberger.bsky.social) April 8, 2026 at 2:32 PM
Early during the war, Congressional Freethought Caucus Co-Chairs Jared Huffman (D-Calif.) and Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) and House Armed Services Subcommittee on Military Personnel Ranking Member Chrissy Houlahan (D-Pa.) led 27 of their colleagues in requesting the Defense Department investigate reports that US commanders were invoking the apocalyptic theology of "End Times" prophecy to justify attacks on Iran.
American leaders have claimed divine sanction for their wars since the nation's inception, from George Washington claiming that "the hand of Providence" favored the revolt against Britain, to George W. Bush declaring that "God is not neutral" as he launched the decadeslong "crusade" against terror after 9/11 that has killed nearly a million people in more than half a dozen countries, almost all of them Muslims.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Most Popular