A recent YouGov survey indicates the majority of US adults believe recreational marijuana should be legal, cannabis has legitimate medical uses and approve its reclassifying to a less restrictive category.
The survey was conducted among 31,080 US adults on December 22, 2025. This was just after US President Donald Trump issued an Executive Order directing reclassification of cannabis from a Schedule I controlled substance to a less restrictive category; Schedule III.
Schedule I of the Controlled Substances List is meant to be confined to drugs that have no accepted medical use and a high abuse potential; e.g. heroin. Schedule III drugs, which includes ketamine, testosterone and codeine have generally accepted medical uses and are considered to have “intermediate abuse potential”.
In the recent YouGov poll, three related questions were asked:
The first was, “Do you think that the recreational use of marijuana should be made legal in the United States or not?”
The responses:
- Yes, it should be made legal: 54%
- No, it should not be made legal: 27%
- Not sure: 19%
A similar question was asked in 2024, but about marijuana generally. Among that group, 62% said “Yes, it should be legal.”
The second question was: “Do you think that marijuana has legitimate medical uses?”
Responses:
- Definitely: 43%
- Probably: 33%
- Probably not: 8%
- Definitely not: 5%
- Not sure: 11%
The same 2024 survey mentioned above indicated 76% said ‘yes’.
And the third question: “Do you approve or disapprove of the government reclassifying marijuana from the most restrictive category of drugs to a less restrictive category that allows for research on its potential medicinal uses?”
Responses:
- Strongly approve: 42%
- Somewhat approve: 28%
- Somewhat disapprove: 8%
- Not sure: 14%
For further breakdown of various aspects such as region, gender, political affiliation, age and race, see the full survey results.
While it appears it will be President Trump that will make rescheduling happen — although it must pass muster during the Drug Enforcement Administration’s (DEA) formal rule-making process — it was his predecessor President Joe Biden who got the ball rolling.
In October 2022, President Biden said he was requesting the Secretary of Health and Human Services and the Attorney General to start a process to review how marijuana is scheduled under federal law. It was a popular decision, with a poll soon after finding 72% of respondents approved changing how federal law classifies marijuana as a Schedule I drug.
