Feds Should Consider ‘Relaxing’ Marijuana Drug Testing Rules For Transportation Workers, Congresswoman Says

A Democratic congresswoman is pushing the federal government to consider
“relaxing” strict drug testing rules for transportation workers that punish
people for marijuana use outside of work hours that doesn’t actually lead
to being high on the job.

Rep. Emily Randall (D-WA) told colleagues at a hearing this month that
current policy is impeding efforts to ensure there’s a “robust workforce”
to staff ferries that are a popular form of transportation in her home
state of Washington.

The congresswoman, who is a co-chair of the Congressional Ferry Caucus,
said lawmakers need to be open to “creative solutions” to the problem.

“Federal regulations require drug testing for some maritime employees in
safety-sensitive positions, including ferry workers,” she said. We could
consider relaxing the rules around recreational marijuana use in states
where it’s legal, as long as it’s not used on the job and outside a certain
window before their shift.”

“Right now, you could drug test positive for a month or longer after using
legal recreational marijuana in Washington and be unable to work as a ferry
operator,” Randall said at the the “member day” hearing before the House
Transportation and Infrastructure Committee.

Randall is cosponsoring legislation to federally legalize marijuana,
promote equity and address the collateral consequences of prohibition. The
Marijuana Opportunity, Reinvestment and Expungement (MORE) Act passed the
House twice under Democratic control but has not advanced in the current
Congress.

While that bill would deschedule marijuana by removing it from the
Controlled Substances Act (CSA) altogether, the Trump administration is
actively considering a proposal to move cannabis from Schedule I of the CSA
to Schedule III.

Last month, the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) published a
bulletin advising that all safety-sensitive workers must still comply with
federal drug testing requirements, even as the president is directing the
attorney general to complete a cannabis rescheduling process.

While the department didn’t quite specify what would change if the reform
is ultimately enacted, it in effect said that nothing has changed for now.

DOT clarified that, until Attorney General Pam Bondi finalizes the
rescheduling action, marijuana remains a Schedule I drug. Therefore, it
“remains unacceptable for any safety‐sensitive employee subject to drug
testing under the Department of Transportation’s drug testing regulations
to use marijuana.”

Additionally, “Until the rescheduling process is complete, the Department
of Transportation’s drug testing process and regulations will not change,”
the notice says.

“Transportation employees in safety-sensitive positions will still be
subject to testing for marijuana,” DOT said. “Furthermore, the Department’s
guidance on medical and recreational marijuana and CBD are still in effect.”

Laboratories, medical review officers and substance misuse professionals
must still comply with existing drug testing rules, so there are “no
changes to your roles and responsibilities as they relate to marijuana.”

“We will continue to monitor the rescheduling process and update the
transportation industry as appropriate,” the department said. “We want to
assure the traveling public that our transportation system is the safest it
can possibly be.”

While it seemed as if DOT was leaving room open for a possible internal
policy change if marijuana rescheduling is ultimately finalized, former
Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieig said in 2024 that placing cannabis
in Schedule III wouldn’t affect drug testing policies for commercial
truckers, noting that the department specifically lists marijuana as
substance to screen.

“Our understanding of the rescheduling of marijuana from Schedule I to
schedule III is that it would not alter DOT’s marijuana testing
requirements with respect to the regulated community,” the former Biden
administration official said. “For private individuals who are performing
safety-sensitive functions subject to drug testing, marijuana is identified
by name, not by reference to one of those classes. So even if it moves in
its classification, we do not believe that that would have a direct impact
on that authority.”

The reason rescheduling on its own wouldn’t change DOT policy is based on
an interpretation of the 1991 Omnibus Transportation Employee Testing Act,
which grants the transportation secretary with discretion to test for any
controlled substances that they’ve “determined has a risk to transportation
safety.”

Buttigieg was responding to a question from Rep. Rick Crawford (R-AR)
during a House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee hearing. The
congressman had referenced concerns from the American Trucking Associations
(ATA) “about the broad public health and safety consequences of
reclassification on the national highway system and its users.”

The latest notice comes about three months after DOT proposed a separate
rule to update its drug testing guidelines, revising terminology around
cannabis in a way that provides more specificity related to THC.

While it’s widely understood that driving under the influence of cannabis
is dangerous, the relationship between consumption and impairment is a
messy one.

In 2024, for example, a scientific review of available evidence on the
relationship between cannabis and driving found that most research
“reported no significant linear correlations between blood THC and measures
of driving,” although there was an observed relationship between levels of
the cannabinoid and reduced performance in some more complex driving
situations.

“The consensus is that there is no linear relationship of blood THC to
driving,” the paper concluded. “This is surprising given that blood THC is
used to detect cannabis-impaired driving.”

In a separate 2024 report, NHTSA said there’s “relatively little research”
backing the idea that THC concentration in the blood can be used to
determine impairment, again calling into question laws in several states
that set “per se” limits for cannabinoid metabolites.

“Several states have determined legal per se definitions of cannabis
impairment, but relatively little research supports their relationship to
crash risk,” that report says. “Unlike the research consensus that
establishes a clear correlation between [blood alcohol content] and crash
risk, drug concentration in blood does not correlate to driving impairment.”

Similarly, a Department of Justice (DOJ) researcher said last February that states
may need to “get away from that idea” that marijuana impairment can be
tested based on the concentration of THC in a person’s system.

“If you have chronic users versus infrequent users, they have very
different concentrations correlated to different effects,” Frances Scott, a
physical scientist at the National Institute of Justice (NIJ) Office of
Investigative and Forensic Sciences under DOJ, said.

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