A DEA judge paused the rescheduling case that would reach adult use. The report that stopped it does not mention cannabis.

As of October 1, 2026. The federal proceeding that could move all marijuana to Schedule III, including adult use, is on hold. DEA Chief Administrative Law Judge Derek C. Julius stayed it on Tuesday, September 29, so the parties can argue over whether a government report published six days earlier belongs in the record.

That proceeding is the one that matters most in the Virgin Islands. The territory’s program is almost entirely adult use.

What the judge did

Three of the seven parties opposing rescheduling asked Julius to reopen the hearing record and admit a report the Government Accountability Office published on September 23. The three are DUID Victim Voices, the National Drug and Alcohol Screening Association, and Kenneth Finn, a physician. Their argument, per Marijuana Moment’s account of the motion, is that the government’s case is “only as good as the process that produced it.”

Julius did not rule on whether the report gets in. The judge stayed the case while that question is briefed. From the order: the judge “finds merit in this argument that, if the record were to be extended to also include the GAO Report, a stay would be warranted to await briefing on it.”

DEA has until October 13 to respond, in no more than 20 pages. The other parties may file responses but are not required to. The order sets no date for completing the review and no date for lifting the stay. Some coverage has described the pause as two weeks, which matches the filing deadline rather than anything the order says.

The hearing record in this proceeding closed on August 17. The judge’s recommended decision had no due date before the stay, and it has none now.

What the GAO report says, and what it does not

The report is titled “Drug Scheduling: While DEA Decisions Have Aligned with Recent HHS Recommendations, Both Need Comprehensive Policies.” Its two central findings are about missing internal procedure. GAO found that DEA “does not have policies that identify roles, responsibilities, and procedures related to scheduling,” and that FDA “does not have policies or procedures specifying how its staff are to conduct evaluations or develop recommendations.” It makes three recommendations, to the DEA Administrator, the FDA Commissioner, and the FDA Commissioner together with the NIH Director. All three are open.

The report’s other finding runs the other direction. GAO reviewed 208 scheduling actions from 2020 through 2025. Of the 95 substances that required an HHS evaluation, DEA’s decision matched the HHS recommendation in all 84 cases that had a published final rule as of December 31, 2025.

The report does not discuss marijuana or cannabis. The word does not appear in its findings or recommendations. It is a review of how two agencies document their scheduling work in general.

What is not stayed

The April order is untouched. On April 22, Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche signed the Final Order placing two narrow categories in Schedule III: marijuana in FDA-approved drug products, and marijuana subject to a qualifying state medical marijuana license. It was published in the Federal Register on April 28 and took effect. The D.C. Circuit declined on September 9 to freeze it while a separate challenge proceeds. The September 29 stay does nothing to that order or that case.

So the narrow federal change stands, and the broad one that would cover adult use is paused. The April order and its Virgin Islands implications sets out what Schedule III would do for a licensee here: DEA registration, Section 280E tax relief, and an easier banking posture.

Why the stayed track is the one that counts here

The Virgin Islands Cannabis Use Act legalized medical, sacramental, and adult use. Ten conditional dispensaries across St. Thomas, St. John, and St. Croix are preparing to sell to adults 21 and over, with no card required. Those sales are the business the territory has spent nearly four years building toward.

Against that, the medical registry is small. Executive Director Joanne Moorehead reported 40 active medical patients to the Cannabis Advisory Board on September 24, a figure she said moves between 40 and 45 with renewals. One sacramental organization is approved.

The April order, if it reaches Virgin Islands licenses at all, touches the medical side. The stayed proceeding is the one that would touch the rest.

The April rule’s definition of a qualifying license includes one issued by “a federal territorial entity,” so the territory is within its reach on paper. What is unresolved is whether a Virgin Islands license, which covers medical, sacramental, and adult-use sales together, counts as a license “for medical purposes.” No party in either federal track has raised that question, and the Virgin Islands is not a party to either one. The Office of Cannabis Regulation has published nothing on federal rescheduling since April and has not said how it reads the April order.

The local calendar does not move

Nothing in the September 29 order changes the territory’s sequence, because none of it was ever gated on a federal schedule. A Tier 1 grower on St. Croix holds the territory’s first commercial cultivation Certificate to Operate, issued September 24. Moorehead told the board the same day that the St. Croix testing laboratory is up and waiting on plants to test, and every product has to pass it before sale. Dispensaries remain gated on facility sign-off and product.

What to watch

• October 1, 10 a.m. OCR’s licensee information session on the cannabis career expo.
• October 13. DEA’s response on whether the GAO report belongs in the record. The filing is capped at 20 pages, and it is the first indication of how DEA intends to answer the reopening request.
• October 22. The Cannabis Advisory Board’s next meeting, where a vote on the full intoxicating hemp rules is expected.
• October 26 and 28. The Cannabis Industry Career Expo, on St. Thomas and St. Croix.
• Whether Julius admits the report. If he does, supplemental briefing follows and the recommended decision moves further out. If the judge does not, the stay lifts with the record as it closed on August 17.
• Any OCR statement on whether Virgin Islands licenses fit the April order’s definition. There has been none since April.