BREAKING: U.S. Attorney General Misses Legal Deadline to Issue HALT Fentanyl Research Guidelines

Failure to act delays research, exacerbates “research harm,” and undermines Congressional intent, says Students for Sensible Drug Policy (SSDP), a leading nonprofit representing impacted graduate students, post-docs, staff scientists, professors, and others in the scientific and medical research fields.

Washington, D.C. — January 16, 2026 — The U.S. Attorney General has missed a legally mandated deadline to issue interim research guidelines required under the Halt All Lethal Trafficking of Fentanyl (HALT Fentanyl) Act, signed into law on July 16, 2025.

The HALT Fentanyl Act required the Attorney General to publish interim rules within six months establishing new processes for Schedule I research registration, along with an opportunity for public comment and a request for a hearing. As of 5:00 p.m. ET on January 16, 2026, no such interim rules had been announced.

“This failure to act leaves researchers, institutions, and regulators without clear guidance and directly contributes to research harm — the preventable damage caused when restrictive or unclear drug policies obstruct legitimate scientific research,” said Kat Murti, Executive Director of Students for Sensible Drug Policy (SSDP), the largest youth-led network dedicated to ending the War on Drugs. “Research harm delays medical innovation, limits evidence-based policymaking, and slows the development of potential treatments for overdose, pain, addiction, and mental health conditions.”

What the HALT Fentanyl Act Was Supposed to Do

The HALT Fentanyl Act permanently placed more than 100 fentanyl-related substances into Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act. While SSDP strongly opposes the expanded criminalization of any drug, the law also created new pathways intended to streamline Schedule I research, including:

Expedited registration for researchers who already hold Schedule II licenses
Expedited amendments to existing Schedule I registrations
Permitting a single registration to cover multiple related research sites under certain circumstances
Authorization for registered researchers to conduct limited manufacturing activities without obtaining a separate manufacturing license

Congress explicitly required the Attorney General to clarify how these provisions would function in practice. That clarification has not occurred.

SSDP’s Science Policy Committee: Grounding Advocacy in Evidence

Students for Sensible Drug Policy’s Science Policy Committee is a multidisciplinary body of scientists, clinicians, and policy experts dedicated to advancing evidence-based drug policy. The Committee evaluates how drug scheduling, enforcement, and regulatory frameworks affect scientific research and public health, and provides expert guidance to policymakers on reducing research barriers and harms.

“While SSDP does not condone either the increased criminalization of fentanyl-related substances or the decision to place more drugs into Schedule I, we do recognize that the HALT Fentanyl Act included provisions that could improve access to Schedule I substances for legitimate research and foster greater collaboration. However, this is not the goal post but only the beginning of necessary reforms of the Controlled Substances Act.” said Dr. Alaina Jaster, Ph.D., pharmacologist and toxicologist and Co-Chair of SSDP’s Science Policy Committee. “These provisions have the potential to reduce research harms — but only if they are implemented clearly, consistently, and in consultation with the scientific community. Without guidance, confusion and delay are inevitable.”

Ongoing Confusion on the Ground

The consequences of this delay are already evident. A member of SSDP’s Science Policy Committee attempted to follow the new process outlined in the HALT Fentanyl Act by notifying the Attorney General of their intent to conduct Schedule I research using an existing Schedule II license, while also submitting a standard DEA application in parallel.

“Around the time we were beginning the registration process, we became aware of Schedule I provisions in the HALT Fentanyl Act, which suggests that researchers with an existing Schedule II license — which we had — may be able to work with Schedule I substances after notifying the DEA, rather than obtaining a separate Schedule I registration. We decided to pursue this option cautiously by sending a notification letter to the Attorney General in accordance with the Act, while also submitting our standard DEA application in parallel,” the researcher explained. “We never received a response regarding the HALT letter, and when we asked local DEA officers about it directly, they appeared largely unfamiliar with the specifics of the legislation.”

“The HALT Fentanyl Act is a starting point for implementing improvements to researching controlled substances and these expedited processes will potentially reduce barriers, but in some cases the HALT Fentanyl Act may make processes more confusing, especially as more time goes on without clear guidance from regulatory bodies,” said Dr. Jaster.

Modernizing Schedule I research policy is essential for enabling scientific innovation, improving public health outcomes, and ensuring that U.S. researchers can fully explore the therapeutic potential of controlled substances without hindrance.

“Congress gave the Attorney General a clear deadline and a clear mandate: reduce barriers to research while ensuring transparency and public input,” said Murti. “Missing this deadline is not a neutral administrative failure — it actively perpetuates research harm. When scientists are left navigating vague or contradictory rules, lifesaving research is delayed, innovation stalls, and public health suffers.”

Recommendations to Further Reduce Research Harm.

SSDP urges federal agencies and lawmakers to go beyond the HALT Fentanyl Act and adopt additional reforms to meaningfully reduce research barriers and harms, including:

Modernizing the definition of “currently accepted medical use” so that it is not limited to FDA-approved substances, recognizing the medical value of basic and translational research. Several lines of evidence exist to show that basic research has medical value, most notably the Breakthrough Therapy (21 U.S.C. § 356 (a)) and Right to Try (21 U.S.C. § 300.200) statuses of several psychedelic compounds that are Schedule I (Siegel et al., 2023; Healey, 2025).
Requiring periodic external scientific review of novel literature on drug classes, specific compounds and modern research techniques to inform HHS and DEA decision-making. HHS review of research must be consistent with current research and utilize what is considered the “golden standard” of understanding abuse potential (Gauvin et al., 2018).
Eliminating the 1996 HHS appropriations rider that prohibits federal funding from being spent on “any activity that promotes the legalization of any drug or other substance in Schedule I” and limits spending to cases in which “there is significant medical evidence of a therapeutic advantage to the use of such drug or other substance or that federally sponsored clinical trials are being conducted to determine therapeutic advantage.” This language stifles innovation and discourages drug development by preventing companies from applying for federal funding to study Schedule I drugs for the purpose of developing a drug for potential FDA approval (PUBLIC LAW 118–47, 138 STAT. 704).
Amending the HALT Fentanyl Act to allow Schedule I substances to be treated as Schedule III for research purposes, eliminating ambiguity and unnecessary administrative burden. Previous work has suggested a “Schedule B” would accomplish this for research purposes (Lawrence & Pozen, 2025).

“The lack of guidance from the AG and DEA on this new process is only going to fuel confusion and contention within our system,” said Dr. Jaster. “Researchers want to remain compliant with their registrations, as their research livelihood and the advancement of science relies on that compliance. But, it has been seen time and time again the government continues to make that difficult and breaks their own mandates. We hope to see them take action and provide guidance sooner rather than later instead of ignoring researchers.”

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With chapters on campuses and in communities across the country, Students for Sensible Drug Policy (SSDP) is the largest youth-led network dedicated to replacing the disastrous War on Drugs with policies rooted in evidence, compassion, and human rights, at a grassroots level.

For more information, please visit: https://ssdp.org.

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BREAKING: U.S. Attorney General Misses Legal Deadline to Issue HALT Fentanyl Research Guidelines