THE MONEY BEHIND an effort to recriminalize recreational marijuana in Massachusetts has, more or less, flown in from outside the state.
Newly filed political finance records show that all $1.55 million raised by the controversial ballot question campaign in its first few months came from SAM Action Inc., a national dark-money group that opposes legal drug use but is not required to disclose the source of its own funding.
It’s the same organization that bankrolled opposition to a 2024 Massachusetts ballot question that sought to open up access to some psychedelic substances, which voters rejected.
Massachusetts is not alone as a battleground, either. SAM Action is also the only donor behind a ballot question in Maine this cycle that would similarly prohibit recreational pot use there, as the Portland Press Herald reported.
Both campaigns have generated scrutiny over their efforts to gather signatures from voters.
In Massachusetts, opponents filed an objection alleging the campaign “obtained signatures fraudulently” by telling voters the measure would provide affordable housing or fund public parks, not that it would ban recreational marijuana.
The State Ballot Law Commission heard arguments last week and is expected to rule by Friday. State law empowers the panel to determine whether signatures were placed on a ballot question petition “by fraud,” and its interpretation could set off a lengthier court battle over whether the question can go before voters.
Similarly, Mainers have been alleging in recent weeks that they were misled about what the anti-marijuana petition would do when they signed it. Maine’s secretary of state, Shenna Bellows, said she’s received complaints about the topic, adding that she has no enforcement power because, as she put it to lawmakers, “You have a right to lie under the First Amendment.”
Wendy Wakeman, a veteran Republican operative who is working as spokesperson for the repeal campaign, said the Massachusetts and Maine questions are “not a coordinated effort” despite funding coming from the same national group.
SAM Action is a 501(c)(4) organization, so its donors are private, leaving unclear exactly who is putting major dollars toward shutting down an industry both Massachusetts and Maine voted nearly a decade ago to legalize.
On its website, SAM Action claims affiliation with the nonprofit Smart Approaches to Marijuana group co-founded by former US Rep. Patrick Kennedy — a Democrat who represented Rhode Island, and the son of longtime US Sen. Ted Kennedy — along with former White House Office of National Drug Control Policy advisor Kevin Sabet and David Frum, a former speechwriter for President George W. Bush who is now a senior editor at The Atlantic.
Wakeman declined to comment on SAM Action’s primary donors.
“Massachusetts is in the minority of states in the United States in which marijuana is available recreationally,” she told CommonWealth Beacon. “It should be unsurprising that national groups with health concerns are interested in helping Massachusetts craft better, safer marijuana laws.”
While marijuana remains illegal under federal law, 24 states, two territories, and Washington, DC, allow recreational marijuana use by adults, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Several others decriminalized the drug without fully legalizing personal, non-medical use.
President Trump last year also signed an executive order reclassifying marijuana as a drug with less potential for harm and dependence, signaling a softer position. SAM opposed that move.
Voters in the Bay State approved recreational marijuana use in 2016 by a margin of 54 percent to 46 percent. Since then, the industry has generated more than $8 billion in sales.
The proposed ballot question would undo legalization of recreational pot use. It would leave the medical marijuana industry in place, but expand civil penalties for public possession above one ounce.
The campaign committee working on the anti-recreational marijuana question in Massachusetts spent about $1.4 million in 2025, the vast majority of which went toward paid signature-gathering in an attempt to secure a spot on the 2026 ballot.
Each campaign needed to collect at least 74,574 signatures from registered Massachusetts voters to clear an early hurdle en route to the 2026 ballot. Organizers will need another, smaller round of signatures later this year to lock in their spots.
All ballot question campaigns must file 2025 year-end financial reports by the end of the day Tuesday. Several others have already disclosed significant fundraising and spending, with most of the money similarly going toward the arduous effort of gathering enough voter signatures.
Under state law, the campaigns do not need to submit their next financial disclosures until September, keeping most of the fundraising and spending obscured from public view until close to the election.
The Senate last week approved legislation that would require ballot question campaign committees to file financial reports at least monthly in election years. It’s not clear if or when the House will take up the measure.