At DEA Hearing in Virginia, Sheriff Honsal Testified in Favor of Cannabis Legalization and Regulation, According to People in Attendance 61%
By Ryan Burns85%
7/20/2026, 4:34:50 PM
Topics: Drug Policy, Criminal Justice
BS Summary: This article contains 16 faulty reasoning types, including Unattributed Quote, Negativity Bias, and Halo Effect, with Biased Writer Voice as the most egregious example at 38.2% saturation with 192 hits. Analysis detected 1,015 faulty-reasoning hits from 503 analyzed words, generating a BS Score of 57.2% and a BS Rank of 61% (7,509 of 18,920 articles). This article is worse (more manipulative) than 60.30% of the article peer group.
Well, if the anti-weed states of Nebraska, Idaho and Indiana thought they’d found an ally in Humboldt County Sheriff William Honsal, they may have been disappointed by the testimony he offered during last week's DEA rescheduling hearing in Virginia.
As previously reported, that trio of red states called Honsal as a key expert witness in a federal administrative hearing concerning whether cannabis/marijuana should be reclassified from Schedule I to the less-restrictive Schedule III of the Controlled Substances Act.
We’re working on getting our hands on an official transcript of the proceedings, but people who were in attendance report that while Honsal did lament the continued existence of an illicit weed industry — one that's replete with organized crime, trespass grows, human trafficking and nasty pesticide use — he ultimately described California's regulated, legal market as a good thing.
Under cross-examination from attorneys with the U.S.
Department of Justice, Honsal testified that most of the California cannabis being shipped out-of-state comes from unlicensed operators, rather than the legal market.
That's according to attorneys with the law firm Vicente LLP, who were in the room.
A correspondent for the advising and consulting firm Cannabis Wise Guys who also attended the hearing offered a lengthy recap of Honsal's testimony on Instagram.
He said Honsal testified that about one-third of the roughly 1,500 grows that remain in Humboldt County are illegal and credited Prop. 64 with allowing the state to have “real regulation.”
High Times magazine reports that Honsal's testimony "undercut a central implication of [those states’] crime argument, that the regulated market itself was the engine of the crime they described."
The reporter from Cannabis Wise Guys quoted Honsal as saying , “Legal growers would come talk about their past, how happy they are to be legal and not have to fear law enforcement anymore.”
There may be some truth to that, though as we reported last week, local licensed farmers have been complaining in recent weeks about low-altitude helicopter flights being conducted by the Northern California Coalition to Safeguard Communities, a multi-county law enforcement group funded by the Howard G.
Buffett Foundation.
It remains unclear why Honsal agreed to testify for Nebraska, Idaho and Indiana.
A spokesperson for his office declined to answer any questions about his testimony, his trip to Virginia or any related matters.
A pre-hearing statement filed by those three states said, “Based on his experience, [Honsal] believes that legalization and changes in marijuana laws contributed to a significant expansion of the illicit marijuana market rather than its elimination.”
If the reports from inside the courtroom are correct, Honsal wound up saying something quite contrary to that.
Both parties in these proceedings now have nearly a month to submit optional post-hearing briefs.
Chief Administrative Law Judge Derek Julius, who presided over the hearing, will decide whether to recommend for or against rescheduling.
DEA Administrator Terry Cole will make the agency’s final determination.
Analysis
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