Three ballot initiatives to legalize cannabis for adult use failed to pass votes in Florida and the Dakotas on November 5. It was an abrupt check to momentum for state-level legalization in recent years—even if medical marijuana in Nebraska, city decriminalization initiatives in Texas and over 100 local medical marijuana ordinances in Kentucky all passed.
In Florida, Amendment 3 to legalize cannabis had generated headlines and controversy. It ultimately garnered a clear majority of the vote—almost 56 percent—but fell short of the 60 percent required for a constitutional amendment under state law. Despite not being enough for victory, the majority vote underlines what has become bipartisan support for the issue, in a state that swung decisively to Donald Trump in the presidential election.
The Smart and Safe Florida campaign behind Amendment 3 had amassed a war chest of over $150 million to fund its efforts—bolstered by the high-profile endorsement of Trump in September. He reportedly chose to back the measure shortly after a meeting with Florida Senator Joe Gruters (R) and Kim Rivers, CEO of TruLieve—a medical marijuana company which donated nearly half the campaign’s funding, and which stood to benefit the most if Amendment 3 had succeeded.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis (R) was meanwhile the most prominent opponent of Amendment 3, even allocating taxpayer funds and millions of dollars from the state’s opioid settlement fund to bankroll the campaign against it. Multiple times, DeSantis urged voters to reject Amendment 3, in part due to the bill’s absence of at-home cannabis cultivation protections—the strangeness of which caught the attention of leading cannabis advocates.
The measure, had it passed, would have allowed adults aged 21 and older to purchase and possess up to 3 ounces of cannabis for personal use, with a limit of 5 grams for concentrates. Medical cannabis dispensaries would have been permitted to “acquire, cultivate, process, manufacture, sell, and distribute marijuana products and accessories to adults for personal use.”
State officials would have had the option—but would not have been required—to authorize additional cannabis businesses. The proposal emphasized that the legislature could still “enact laws consistent with this amendment,” and specified that it would not impact federal law, an apparent attempt to avoid repeats of past legal challenges over ballot language.
Besides home cultivation, the initiative notably did not include provisions for expungement of past records, nor social equity measures to help people impacted by prohibition to benefit from the industry. For such reasons, it was heavily criticized by many legalization advocates.
“Voters are thinking critically about not just whether to legalize, but how to do it in a way that benefits consumers and communities, not just large corporations.”
Shaleen Title, founder of the Parabola Center for Law and Policy, was among them. Welcoming the defeat of Amendment 3, she cited its “failure to include provisions for social equity, home cultivation, or limits on industry consolidation” as real-world evidence that “voters are thinking critically about not just whether to legalize, but how to do it in a way that benefits consumers and communities, not just large corporations.”
“Amendment 3’s near-total funding by Trulieve raised legitimate concerns about market fairness and consumer choice,” Title told Filter.
She also noted that “Florida’s rejection of [the measure] echoes a similar message sent by Ohio voters in 2015, when they struck down a measure that would have granted exclusive growing rights to just 10 producers.”
North and South Dakota Voters Say No
In both North and South Dakota, majorities of voters rejected measures to legalize cannabis for adult use.
Around 53 percent of voters in North Dakota opposed Measure 5. It would have covered possession of up to 1 ounce of flower, 4 grams of concentrate and 300 milligrams of edibles, as well as home cultivation of up to three plants.
The state would have licensed a total of 18 dispensaries, but like Amendment 3, the measure contained no criminal-legal remedies or social-equity provisions. Recent polling had suggested a slight lead for Measure 5, which will make its defeat all the more disappointing to local advocates.
Voters in South Dakota, meanwhile, had previously approved a cannabis legalization initiative in 2020, only to see the result struck down by the state’s Supreme Court the following year, based on ballot language ruled to be too broad.
In 2022, advocates tried again, but Measure 27 was defeated by about six percentage points.
This time around, they voted on Measure 29, but it lost by a significantly bigger margin, with almost 56 percent opposed and 44 percent in favor.
Measure 29 was backed by South Dakota’s medical marijuana industry, which sought to build on that original 2020 voter-approved legalization initiative. To sidestep a similar legal challenge, Measure 29 proposed legalizing possession and limited home cultivation for adults over 21, but notably did not include a regulatory structure for adult-use sales.
Kevin Sabet claimed that the 2024 election yielded “the strongest anti-drug vote we’ve seen in more than a decade.”
Despite a number of local-level victories for cannabis reform—and the passage of an Oregon measure intended to help cannabis-industry workers unionize—November 5 turned into a big night for Smart Approaches to Marijuana (SAM), the DC-based organization leading opposition campaigns in several states.
Kevin Sabet, the founder of SAM and a former White House drug policy advisor, claimed that the 2024 election yielded “the strongest anti-drug vote we’ve seen in more than a decade.”
“Americans from all backgrounds may have been divided about other races, but they were united in their belief that we do not need to legalize marijuana or psychedelics,” his statement continued, also referencing the defeat of Question 4, the psychedelics measure in Massachusetts.
In Florida, Sabet highlighted gubernatorial opposition to Amendment 3: “Governor DeSantis was steadfast in his opposition to this initiative because he understands the dangers associated with these drugs” he said, “and we want to thank him for his principled stance for public health and safety.” He also heralded repeated rejections of marijuana legalization in the Dakotas.
The spread of legalization has long felt inevitable. But the current total of 24 states (plus Washington, DC) which have legalized cannabis for adult use remains the same as it was before Election Day. On a night that saw the defeat of Kamala Harris, the first major presidential nominee to endorse federal legalization, advocates will know they still have a long struggle ahead.
Photograph by RDNE Stock Project via Pexels
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