Sen. Jeff Merkley introduced the Secure and Fair Enforcement Banking Act of 2026 on June 25, joined by Sens. Elizabeth Warren, Lisa Murkowski, and Steve Daines, giving it bipartisan cover from day one. Rep. David Joyce led companion legislation in the House with seven colleagues.
The bill would bar federal regulators from terminating or limiting a bank’s deposit insurance simply because it serves state-legal cannabis businesses, and from pressuring banks to exit those relationships. Hemp and CBD-related businesses would get protection too.
Only 816 banks, roughly one-fifth of U.S. depository institutions, currently serve cannabis businesses, according to FinCEN’s 2024 marijuana banking data. The rest face a compliance grey zone that pushes cannabis operators into all-cash operations, what Merkley called “dangerous for our communities.”
The bill traces to 2013 and has passed the House seven times since becoming SAFE Banking in 2017. The Senate has never passed it.
The 2026 bill has something earlier versions didn’t: cannabis is now federally classified as Schedule III, not Schedule I. Under the prior classification, banks worried the DOJ could treat cannabis deposits as narcotics proceeds regardless of state law. At Schedule III, that threat shrinks. It’s now about codifying what regulators can and can’t penalize. The American Bankers Association endorsed the 2026 bill as a “clear federal safe harbor,” language that would have been unlikely in 2017.
No Senate markup has been scheduled.
James Okafor