The passage of the 2018 $1.3-trillion spending bill on Friday will afford millions of medical marijuana patients a degree of reprieve. With its passage, the bipartisan provision known as Rohrbacher-Blumenthaler provision will ensure that large aspects of the Obama-era Cole Memo will remain in effect until, at the very least, September of 2018, and potentially much longer. Prior to the bill’s passage, at the stroke of President Trump’s pen, there was some doubt and consternation in the medical (and recreational-cannabis) circles from providers and growers down to patients who use medical MJ to alleviate symptoms from diseases and disorders as disparate as cancer and anxiety.

The medical cannabis industry, and the cannabis industry at large, has experienced some swirling doubts and headwinds in the first quarter of 2018, particularly since the Trump-appointed head of the Department of Justice, Jeff Sessions, called for the Cole Memo to be rescinded in January of this year. The passage of the omnibus budget ensures that Sessions’ call will go unheeded for now, with the 30 states where medical-use is legal being afforded the right to allow patients the right to use. With its passage, over two million US citizens can continue to responsibly use prescribed medical marijuana.

While the passage grants some relief, the matter could become pressing as soon as this fall once again, due to the inclusion of the Rohrbacher-Blumenthaler provision as a budgetary matter (it has to be “renewed”/appropriated into each fiscal year’s budget for the US), versus it simply becoming a law. The provision has been on the books since 2014, but due to a myriad of issues within the Congress and the Senate, not least of which is continued partisan squabbling and grandstanding, Rohrbacher-Blumenthaler finds itself in limbo on an annual basis. While the matter of the provision’s permanence is in an ongoing state of “still to be determined,” it never hurts to pay attention to what issues show up on the ballots and to vote. Citizens across the country will get just that opportunity come this fall with the midterm elections.