Wisconsin’s GOP Senate President Files New Medical Marijuana Legalization Bill

Wisconsin’s Senate president announced on Monday that she and two other
bicameral Republican lawmakers have introduced legislation to legalize
medical marijuana in the state.

Senate President Mary Felzkowski (R), who’s previously sponsored a medical
cannabis bill, said in a press release that she’s filed the new measure
alongside Sen. Patrick Testin (R), with an Assembly companion version from
Assemblymember Patrick Snyder (R).

The text of the proposal hasn’t been posted yet, but Felzkowski’s prior
bill would have allowed doctors to issue medical cannabis recommendations
to patients with one of eight conditions, including cancer, seizure
disorders, post-traumatic stress disorder and multiple sclerosis.

The legislation was fairly restrictive, as it prohibited smokable marijuana
products and wouldn’t have allowed patients to grow cannabis for personal
use. Patients could have only obtained cannabis preparations in the form of
oils, pills, tinctures or topicals.

It’s not clear if the Senate president and her colleagues have expanded the
scope of the reform for the new yet-to-be-released bill.

“Someone who suffers from a serious health condition should not have to
make the choice to travel to another state or break the law so they can try
an alternative medicine for relief,” Felzkowski, a cancer survivor, said in
a press release.

“This legislation is about giving our friends, family members, and
neighbors suffering from a chronic illness the freedom to explore another
option with their doctor,” she said. “This is also a chance for small
businesses in our state to take part in this market with reasonable
regulations on making and selling these products, all while still
protecting public safety.”

As the 2025 session was set to get underway, the Senate leader said she was “hoping
to have a conversation” in the legislature about legalizing medical
marijuana this year—though the Republican Assembly speaker still
represented “an obstacle,” she added.

Meanwhile, a Republican candidate for governor of Wisconsin said in July
that he was “open to considering different opportunities” when it comes to
legalizing medical or adult-use marijuana in the state, though he has
provided little in the way of specifics so far.

On the Democratic side, current Gov. Tony Evers (D), who supports
legalizing cannabis, will not be seeking re-election. But he said in June
that if his party can take control of the legislature, the state can
“finally” legalize marijuana so that residents don’t have to go to
neighboring Illinois to visit its adult-use market.

Separately in June, a poll from Marquette Law School found that two in
three Wisconsin voters support legalizing marijuana.

The survey found that support for cannabis reform has generally increased
over time since the institution first started tracking public opinion on
legalization in 2013, with 67 percent of voters now backing the policy
change. That’s 17 percentage points higher than the 2013 results.

Democrats are the most likely to favor legalizing cannabis, at 88 percent,
followed by independents (79 percent). However, a majority of Republicans
(56 percent) said they’re still opposed to adult-use legalization.

Underscoring the importance of party control, the state’s
Republican-controlled Senate and Assembly this summer rejected another
attempt to legalize marijuana, defeating amendments to budget legislation
that would have ended prohibition in the state and established new medical
and recreational cannabis programs.

Evers has routinely attempted to change that policy as part of his budget
requests—and Democratic leaders have similarly pushed for reform.

Republicans in the legislature also cut the marijuana provisions from a
state budget proposal in May, as they’ve done in past sessions.

Despite Republicans’ move to cut legalization from the budget legislation, party
leaders recently acknowledged that the debate over medical marijuana
legalization is “not going to go away,” and there’s hope it can be resolved
this session.


*— Marijuana Moment is tracking hundreds of cannabis, psychedelics and drug
policy bills in state legislatures and Congress this year. Patreon
supporters pledging at least $25/month get access to our interactive maps,
charts and hearing calendar so they don’t miss any developments.*


*Learn more about our marijuana bill tracker and become a supporter on
Patreon to get access. —*

“I don’t think anyone is naive enough to think that marijuana and THC
products aren’t present in the state of Wisconsin when they are readily
available over state lines, so I think we need to come to an answer on
this,” Assembly Majority Leader Rep. Tyler August (R) said in February.
“I’m hopeful that we can.”

“If we’re going to call it medical marijuana, it needs to be treated like a
pharmaceutical. But the marijuana debate is going to be something that is
not going to go away,” Sen. Dan Feyen (R), the assistant majority leader,
said at the time. “The margins are tighter.”

There have been repeated attempts to legalize medical marijuana in the
legislature over recent years, including the introduction of legislation
from Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (R) that called for a limited program
facilitated through state-run dispensaries. That proved controversial among
his Republican colleagues, however, and it ultimately stalled out last year.

Evers previewed his plan to include marijuana legalization in his budget in
January, while also arguing that residents of the state should be allowed
to propose new laws by putting binding questions on the ballot—citing the
fact that issues such as cannabis reform enjoy sizable bipartisan support
while the GOP-controlled legislature has repeatedly refused to act.

Previously, in 2022, the governor signed an executive order to convene a
special legislative session with the specific goal of giving people the
right to put citizen initiatives on the ballot, raising hopes among
advocates that cannabis legalization could eventually be decided by voters.
The GOP legislature did not adopt the proposal, however.

Evers said in December that marijuana reform is one of several key
priorities the state should pursue in the 2025 session, as lawmakers work
with a budget surplus.

Days after he made the remarks, a survey found the reform would be welcomed
by voters in rural parts of the state. Nearly two thirds (65 percent) said
they support legalizing cannabis.

Last May, the governor said he was “hopeful” that the November 2024
election would lead to Democratic control of the legislature, in part
because he argued it would position the state to finally legalize cannabis.

“We’ve been working hard over the last five years, several budgets, to make
that happen,” he said at the time. “I know we’re surrounded by states with
recreational marijuana, and we’re going to continue to do it.”

A Wisconsin Democratic Assemblymember tried to force a vote on a medical
cannabis compromise proposal last year, as an amendment to an unrelated
kratom bill, but he told Marijuana Moment he suspects leadership intentionally
pulled that legislation from the agenda at the last minute to avoid a
showdown on the issue.

Meanwhile, the state Department of Revenue released a fiscal estimate of
the economic impact of a legalization bill from then-Sen. Melissa Agard (D)
in 2023, projecting that the reform would generate nearly $170 million
annually in tax revenue.

A legislative analysis requested by lawmakers estimated that Wisconsin
residents spent more than $121 million on cannabis in Illinois alone in
2022, contributing $36 million in tax revenue to the neighboring state.

Evers and other Democrats have since at least last January insisted that
they would be willing to enact a modest medical marijuana program, even if
they’d prefer more comprehensive reform.

The post Wisconsin’s GOP Senate President Files New Medical Marijuana
Legalization Bill appeared first on Marijuana Moment.