Federal / DEA Schedule I, Synthetics Only

The DEA published a temporary scheduling order in the Federal Register on August 26, 2026 placing mitragynine pseudoindoxyl, MGM-15 and MGM-16, with their isomers, esters, ethers and salts, into Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act. The order states it is effective August 26, 2026 until August 26, 2028, and the DEA grounded it in a finding that scheduling was necessary to avoid an imminent hazard to public safety. Some trade coverage gives August 25 as the effective date; the Federal Register document itself says August 26. All three are synthetics. They are not constituents of Mitragyna speciosa, so natural leaf is not reached by this order. Any product containing them is now a federal controlled substance, with criminal exposure attached to manufacture, distribution, importing and possession. Hudson Valley Botanicals sells whole-leaf and powdered kratom only and has never sold any of the three, so nothing about our catalog or our shipping changes. The other half of the July 2026 federal action has not happened. The separate order that would schedule 7-hydroxymitragynine above a specified threshold has not issued, and cannot until the comment record closes: on August 26, 2026 the HHS Office of the Assistant Secretary for Health extended the comment window on its Request for Information to September 10, 2026, under docket HHS-OASH-2026-0232. Comments are forwarded by the HHS Secretary for consideration by the Attorney General. The earliest date the order was permitted to publish passed on August 5. Local governments waiting on it, Marion County in Florida among them, are still waiting. One local overlap worth noting for New York readers: Dutchess County Resolution 2026136 names these same three compounds, so the county restriction and the new federal prohibition now cover identical substances.