You interviewed well. You got the offer. You went to the clinic, filled the cup, and a week later a recruiter called to say the offer had been rescinded because the panel came back positive for marijuana. Nothing about your work history changed. Nothing about the interview changed. A test result that says nothing about whether you were impaired at any moment relevant to the job cost you the position.
Nevada is one of the states that decided this specific sequence was unfair, and it wrote that decision into law. Since the start of 2020, a Nevada employer generally cannot refuse to hire an applicant because a screening test showed marijuana. The protection is real, and it is also narrower than most people assume, with a set of exceptions broad enough to swallow a large share of the hiring in southern Nevada.
What follows is what the statute says, where it stops, what changes once you are already on the payroll, and what an applicant can actually do when an offer is pulled.
What Nevada Actually Banned
The controlling provision is NRS 613.132, enacted through Assembly Bill 132 in 2019 and effective at the start of 2020. Its core sentence is short. It is unlawful for any employer in this State to fail or refuse to hire a prospective employee because the prospective employee submitted to a screening test and the results of the screening test indicate the presence of marijuana. The full text of NRS 613.132 is short enough to read in a few minutes and worth reading before any conversation with a recruiter.
The statute defines a screening test as a test of a person’s blood, urine, hair or saliva to detect the general presence of a controlled substance or any other drug. That definition matters, because it captures exactly the kind of testing that detects metabolites left over from use days or weeks earlier rather than active impairment.
The statute turns on two words at the front of it. The prohibition opens with the phrase except as otherwise specifically provided by law, and it applies to a prospective employee. It is a hiring rule, not a general workplace rule. Understanding that boundary is the difference between a real claim and a misunderstanding.
The Exceptions Cover More Ground Than the Rule Suggests
Subsection 2 of NRS 613.132 lists four categories where the hiring protection does not apply, and in a service and construction economy they are significant.
- A position as a firefighter, as that term is defined in NRS 450B.071.
- A position as an emergency medical technician, as defined in NRS 450B.065.
- A position that requires an employee to operate a motor vehicle and for which federal or state law requires the employee to submit to screening tests. This covers commercial drivers subject to federal testing rules.
- A position that, in the determination of the employer, could adversely affect the safety of others.
The fourth one is where most disputes live. It is written in terms of the employer’s own determination, which gives a business considerable room to classify a role as safety sensitive. That room is not unlimited in practice, because a determination has to be a determination. An employer that applies the safety label to every position it fills, including roles with no meaningful safety component, is making a blanket policy rather than a determination about a position. Whether that distinction helps a particular applicant depends on the job description, the employer’s own written policy, how the employer has treated comparable roles, and what the employer actually said when it pulled the offer. Those are evidence questions, and they are answered with documents.
Your Right to a Second Test in the First 30 Days
Subsection 3 of the statute creates a right that almost nobody exercises because almost nobody knows it exists. If an employer requires an employee to submit to a screening test within the first 30 days of employment, the employee has the right to submit to an additional screening test, at their own expense, to rebut the results of the initial screening test. The employer shall accept and give appropriate consideration to the results of that second test.
That is a meaningful tool for a new hire who believes the first result was wrong, whether because of a laboratory error, a chain of custody problem, a cross reactive substance or a legally used hemp derived product. The cost falls on the employee, and the window is short, so speed matters. Anyone in that situation should get the second test through a reputable laboratory promptly, keep the paperwork, and deliver the result to the employer in writing rather than verbally.
The statute requires the employer to accept and give appropriate consideration to the result. It does not say the employer must reach a particular conclusion. Documenting that you provided the rebuttal result, and that the employer either ignored it or never responded, is the part that has value later.
Federal Money, Union Contracts and the Limits of State Law
Subsection 4 sets out three more carve outs, and each of them is common in Nevada.
The protection does not apply to the extent it is inconsistent or otherwise in conflict with the provisions of an employment contract or a collective bargaining agreement. It does not apply to the extent it conflicts with federal law. It does not apply to a position of employment funded by a federal grant.
In practical terms, marijuana remains a controlled substance under federal law, so federal contractors operating under drug free workplace obligations, federally regulated transportation roles and grant funded positions frequently sit outside the state protection entirely. Unionized workplaces are governed first by the agreement. None of that makes an employer automatically right. It does mean the first question in these cases is often about the funding and regulatory status of the specific position rather than about the test result.
Already Hired Is a Very Different Legal Situation
The most important limitation on NRS 613.132 is that it addresses hiring. Once employment begins, Nevada law leans the other way, and two Nevada Supreme Court decisions define the terrain.
In Ceballos v. NP Palace, LLC, decided in 2022, the court addressed an employee terminated after a positive test following off duty recreational use. Nevada has a statute, NRS 613.333, that makes it an unlawful employment practice to refuse to hire or to discharge or discriminate against an employee because the employee engages in the lawful use in this state of any product outside the employer’s premises during nonworking hours, where that use does not adversely affect job performance or the safety of other employees. The court held that because federal law criminalizes marijuana possession, adult recreational use is not lawful use in this state within the meaning of that statute, so it does not support a claim under NRS 613.333.
Nevada’s adult use cannabis chapter points the same direction. NRS 678D.510(1)(a) states that the chapter does not prohibit a public or private employer from maintaining, enacting and enforcing a workplace policy prohibiting or restricting actions or conduct otherwise permitted under the chapter. An employer may lawfully have a zero tolerance policy for existing employees.
The takeaway is not comfortable, but it is clear. Protection at the hiring stage does not carry forward into employment. A current employee who tests positive in Nevada is on far weaker ground than an applicant, unless a different protection applies. If your separation involved something beyond the test itself, such as retaliation, a protected complaint or a discriminatory motive, that is a separate analysis, and our page on wrongful termination in Nevada covers how those claims are framed.
Medical Cannabis Cardholders Have a Separate Protection
Nevada’s medical cannabis statute contains an accommodation duty that the recreational statutes do not. NRS 678C.850 provides that the chapter does not require an employer to allow the medical use of cannabis in the workplace and does not require an employer to modify a job or working conditions that are based on the employer’s reasonable business purposes, but it goes on to say that the employer must attempt to make reasonable accommodations for the medical needs of an employee who engages in the medical use of cannabis if the employee holds a valid registry identification card, provided that the accommodation would not pose a threat of harm or danger to persons or property, impose an undue hardship on the employer, or prevent the employee from fulfilling any and all job responsibilities.
In Freeman Expositions, LLC v. Eighth Judicial District Court, decided in December 2022, the Nevada Supreme Court held that this provision carries an implied private right of action for an employee whose employer failed to provide reasonable accommodation for off site medical cannabis use outside working hours. The same decision rejected several companion theories, declining to allow a tortious discharge claim, a claim under the lawful product statute, or negligent hiring, training and supervision claims on those facts.
The statute also excludes law enforcement agencies, defined to include the Office of the Attorney General, district attorney offices, the Nevada Gaming Control Board and their attorneys, investigators and employees, along with other law enforcement agencies and peace officers. The accommodation duty is framed as an obligation to attempt reasonable accommodation, which in practice looks a great deal like the interactive process employers already run in other contexts. Our discussion of how religious accommodation requests, which follow a similar interactive process, are handled walks through what that dialogue is supposed to look like when an employer takes it seriously.
What to Do When an Offer Is Pulled Over a Positive Screen
Applicants tend to accept the recruiter’s explanation and move on. A short, methodical response preserves options that disappear quickly.
- Get the reason in writing. A polite email asking the employer to confirm the basis for withdrawing the offer often produces the single most useful document in the file.
- Keep the offer letter, the job posting, the job description and every message about the testing requirement. Postings come down within days.
- Request your own copy of the laboratory result and the chain of custody documentation. You are entitled to know what was tested and when.
- If you were already on the payroll and tested within the first 30 days, exercise the rebuttal test right in NRS 613.132 immediately and deliver the result in writing.
- Write down names, titles and dates while the sequence is fresh. Who called, what they said, whether anyone mentioned safety sensitivity or a federal contract.
- Do not sign a severance agreement, a release or an arbitration acknowledgment on the assumption that it is a formality.
One honest caution about remedies. NRS 613.132 states a prohibition, but the section itself does not spell out a damages remedy the way NRS 613.333 does, and how it is enforced in a given situation is a question that turns on the facts and the posture of the case. That is a reason to have a lawyer look at the specifics rather than a reason to assume nothing can be done. A Nevada employment lawyer can evaluate which statute actually fits, and our Las Vegas employment law page describes the range of workplace matters we handle. Where the conduct also involves harassment or mistreatment by someone outside the direct chain of command, our overview of third party harassment claims in Nevada may be relevant as well.
If a Nevada employer withdrew an offer after a marijuana screen, or if you hold a medical cannabis card and your employer refused to discuss any accommodation at all, The Bourassa Law Group offers a free consultation to review the documents and explain what Nevada law does and does not protect in your situation.
This article is general information about Nevada law and is not legal advice. Employment cases turn on specific facts, deadlines and documents, and nothing here substitutes for advice from a lawyer about your own circumstances.
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