Reefer Report Card: The Week in Weed, Rated August 23, 2025 – Vol. 11


Filed under: Weekly Burn
A psychedelic-style graphic with swirling green, red, and orange patterns. Bold yellow text reads “Reefer Report Card Vol. 11,” with a large green cannabis leaf at the center. In the bottom right, the silhouette of a government building dome is shown, symbolizing policy and regulation. The website “PotCultureMagazine.com” appears at the bottom.

Weed reform is a slow-motion car crash. Politicians talk. Regulators posture. Police still raid. And somehow the courts, for once, did the unthinkable and sided with patients. Let’s grade this week in weed and see where the smoke clears.


FEDERAL STALL JOB

Digital artwork of a man with a cigarette, wearing a brightly colored, psychedelic suit and tie, with long blond hair and sunglasses, sitting against a dark background. Image credit: ©2024 Pot Culture Magazine/ArtDept.

Trump Talks Rescheduling While the Clock Runs Out
The White House is “looking at” rescheduling marijuana to Schedule III. That was the headline last week. Nothing has changed. No action, no timeline, no relief for patients or businesses. It is the same grift, the same empty talk, the same scam we called out in Trump’s Cannabis Con.

Grade: F


GOVERNMENT CLOWN CAR AWARD

Connecticut Turns Smoke Shops Into Scapegoats
Enfield police stormed six smoke shops in a sweep that netted arrests for THC sales, labor violations, and underage nicotine sales. The state called it enforcement. Locals called it chaos. Regulators who wrote the rules are now the ones lighting the match. The crackdown won’t fix the broken system. It will just ensure the black market stays thriving.

Grade: F


MOST UNHINGED STORY

Medical Marijuana Patients Win Gun Rights Battle
In a rare burst of common sense, a federal appeals court ruled that medical cannabis patients cannot be stripped of their Second Amendment rights just for following their doctor’s orders. The government could not prove that patients posed a danger, and the judges were not buying the old Reefer Madness playbook. This is a landmark moment. Patients should not have to choose between their medicine and their rights.

Grade: A


LOCAL TRAINWRECK

Steven Tompkins/Suffolk County Sheriff’s Office

Massachusetts Sheriff Charged in Cannabis Extortion Case
Suffolk County Sheriff Steven Tompkins is fighting federal charges that he strong-armed cannabis companies for $50,000 in stock. This is the ugly truth of legalization. Behind every ribbon-cutting and every promise of equity, there are backroom deals, favors owed, and a pay-to-play system that leaves small operators strangled.

Grade: F


PATIENT PITFALL

Florida Hotels Still Banning Patients
In Florida, a card and a prescription do not mean you can light up in a hotel room. Even designated smoking rooms are off-limits for medical cannabis. Patients can medicate on paper, but the state still treats them like criminals the second they step outside their home.

Grade: F


FINAL GRADE: C-


One win for patients in the courts is not enough to clean up a week of broken promises, clown-show enforcement, and corruption. The system is still rigged, the reform is still stalled, and the only progress came from a courtroom that finally decided enough was enough.


©2025 Pot Culture Magazine. All rights reserved. This content is the exclusive property of Pot Culture Magazine and may not be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means without prior written permission from the publisher, except for brief quotations in critical reviews.

F O R T H E C U L T U R E B Y T H E C U L T U R E

Reefer Report Card Vol. 28: The Rescheduling That Wasn’t

This week’s Reefer Report Card cuts through the hype around cannabis “rescheduling,” exposing how a label change left federal prohibition fully intact. Arrest authority, workplace punishment, and immigration penalties remain untouched. Headlines claimed progress. Reality delivered none. A week defined by performance over policy, and reform that never arrived.

THE SCHEDULE III SCAM

Federal officials claim cannabis is moving forward, but Schedule III changes nothing that matters. This investigation breaks down what rescheduling actually does, what it deliberately avoids, and why prohibition logic remains intact. Arrests continue. Markets remain conflicted. Reform language replaces reform action. The system shifts labels while preserving control.

LEGAL WEED, OLD RULES

Legalization promised freedom but preserved prohibition logic. This investigation examines how cannabis reform left arrests, racial disparities, job punishment, medical blame, and equity barriers intact. By tracing enforcement, employment law, healthcare practice, and licensing rules, it shows how legalization changed the label without dismantling the system.


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