Virginia senators have advanced a bill to legalize and regulate recreational marijuana sales—one of several reform proposals under consideration as the 2026 session gets underway.
The Senate Rehabilitation & Social Services Committee on Friday took up two marijuana sales legalization measures. After amending one of the proposals from Sen. Lashrecse Aird (D) with a substitute version, it passed the panel in a 8-7 vote.
The bill largely aligns with recommendations released last month by the legislature’s Joint Commission to Oversee the Transition of the Commonwealth into a Cannabis Retail Market.
Since legalizing cannabis possession and home cultivation in 2021, Virginia lawmakers have worked to establish a commercial marijuana market—only to have those efforts consistently stalled under former Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R), who twice vetoed measures to enact it that were sent to his desk by the legislature.
“In 2021 Virginia became the first southern state to legalize adult use cannabis, and five years later, Virginia has yet to implement the marketplace we originally envisioned,” Aird said. “Each year that we go without a marketplace, the illicit market grows and health and safety concerns rise for our citizens.”
“The legislation establishes a market, once and for all, that will protect consumers, protect health and safety while ensuring balance by creating a market that takes into account the harms created by the disproportionate enforcement of cannabis laws felt by Black and brown communities,” she said.
Under the measure as revised by the committee, adult-use cannabis sales could begin on January 1, 2027.
The bill next heads to the Senate Courts of Justice Committee.
The Senate committee also considered a separate cannabis sales measure sponsored by Sen. Aaron Rouse (D), and incorporated it into Aird’s bill, which will be the main vehicle for the reform this session.
The overall legislation will help to “ensure our communities are safe,” Rouse told the committee on Friday.
“In recent years we’ve seen an unchecked proliferation of illegal and unregulated marijuana stores,” he said. “This has put Virginias at risk as unlicensed drug dealers sells billions of dollars of untested and untaxed products, frequently to children. A well-regulated marijuana retail market is a necessity for public safety and would ensure that products are tested for safety, that they are accurately labeled, sold in a controlled environment and kept away from kids.”
On the House side, members of the General Laws Subcommittee are also slated to hold a hearing on Friday afternoon on a marijuana sales legalization bill from Del. Paul Krizek (D), who chaired the joint commission that produced the regulatory recommendations. That legislation mirrors Aird’s own bill as filed prior to being amended.
Newly sworn-in Gov. Abigail Spanberger (D) supports legalizing adult-use marijuana sales.
“Right now is that we live in this gray space where there’s some legality to marijuana, there’s some illegality,” she said ahead of taking office. “There’s a lot of questions—a lot of confusion—and that creates real problems for Virginians who might currently have the legal ability to buy it for medicinal needs, or for those who might try to fall under the personal use.”
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Meanwhile, Virginia lawmakers have filed other marijuana-related legislation for the 2026 session, including proposals to provide resentencing relief for people convicted of past cannabis crimes and to let terminally ill patients use medical marijuana in hospitals and other healthcare facilities.
Separately, the Virginia Department of Labor and Industry recently published a new outlining workplace protections for cannabis consumers.
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