Tag: legalized marijuana

Minnesota Republicans Warn Of ‘Blackouts And Brownouts’ From Marijuana Cultivation’s Energy Use

Two Minnesota Republican state lawmakers are claiming that home cultivation of cannabis as the result of the legalization law enacted by the Democratic legislature and governor last year could lead to a power failure as grow lights put an overwhelming strain on the state’s electrical grid.

“Now, I hope most of you are not familiar with the marijuana grow operation,” Rep. Paul Novotny (R) said at an event last weekend, “but I will tell you that it takes a ton of electricity.”

“Get ready for blackouts and brownouts. That’s what’s going to happen,” added Sen. Eric Lucero (R), who called cultivation under the law “unsustainable.”

As noted by Heartland Signal, which reported on the event, some states that have legalized marijuana, such as Massachusetts and Illinois, have taken steps to regulate energy use. Many, however, have done little to curb power consumption, according to a New Frontier Data report in 2018 that found that cannabis cultivation in the U.S. consumed about as much energy as the country’s Starbucks stores.

In addition to grow lights, indoor cultivation can also require various temperature and humidity controls, which also consume electricity.

Keep reading

Arizona Lawmakers Approve Bill To Allow Interstate Marijuana Commerce

An Arizona House committee has approved a bill to authorize interstate marijuana commerce, pending a change in federal policy.

After initially rejecting the legislation from Rep. Justin Wilmeth (R) in a split 5-5 vote on Wednesday, the House Commerce Committee reconsidered the measure later in the meeting, reversing course and approving it, 6-4.

If ultimately enacted, Arizona would be joining three other West coast states—California, Oregon and Washington State—that have already adopted laws allowing their governors to enter into agreements to permit marijuana imports and exports between consenting jurisdictions, all of which are principally contingent on federal law changing or guidance explicitly tolerating the commerce.

“The reason I’m running this is because I’m a big believer in interstate commerce,” Wilmeth, who chairs the committee, said at the hearing. “And my understanding is, if we don’t do something like this before the feds legalize it, then we would have to wait a year, maybe two years, for our statute to catch up to whatever the feds do.”

“They could legalize it next week or in 10 years. We really don’t know. But the point of me running this bill this year, this moment, is to be prepared so that when it does come, we can go off to the races and our marijuana industry can be be successful and beneficial in every way possible,” the chairman said. “Obviously, that topic is divisive. Some people don’t like marijuana. I’ve never used this stuff. I don’t care for it either. But that’s not the question of this bill today. It is merely about the commercial commerce side of it.”

Under the Arizona bill, interstate cannabis commerce agreements would need to “ensure enforceable public health and safety standards and include a system to regulate and track the interstate delivery of marijuana and marijuana products.”

Keep reading

Washington State Marijuana Homegrow Proposal Dies In House Committee Without Getting A Vote

Adults in Washington State who grow marijuana at home will continue to face the threat of felony charges for at least another year following a House committee’s failure to advance a cannabis homegrow bill ahead of a legislative deadline this week.

HB 2194 was not called for a vote in the House Appropriations Committee before the February 5 deadline for bills to pass out of fiscal panels, meaning it’s no longer eligible to move forward. The marijuana home cultivation measure passed out of a separate House committee last month, though lawmakers on both sides of the aisle said they were wary of the change.

Washington was one of the first U.S. states to legalize adult-use marijuana, passing a ballot initiative in 2012. Growing marijuana for personal use without a state medical card, however, remains a Class C felony, carrying up to five years in prison and up to $10,000 in fines.

Legislative efforts to allow personal cultivation stretch back to at least 2015, but so far each has failed.

Lead sponsor Rep. Shelley Kloba (D) did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

“This bill is actually a long time coming,” Kloba told colleagues at last month’s committee hearing. “This is something that many other states have done, and it is time for us to do it, as well.”

If passed, HB 2194 would have allowed adults 21 and older to grow up to four plants per person, with no more than 10 allowed per household.

Keep reading

Ohio Lawmaker Warns Colleagues They Risk Losing Reelection For Undermining Voter-Approved Marijuana Legalization Law

An Ohio lawmaker is warning colleagues that passing legislation to undermine voters’ decision to legalize marijuana in the state will jeopardize their reelection prospects—specifically cautioning against proposals to redirect tax revenue to law enforcement.

Rep. Juanita Brent (D)—who has previously emphasized the need to involve people who’ve been disproportionately impacted by cannabis criminalization in the legalization implementation process—spoke about the politics of marijuana policy in the legislature during a panel organized by the Ohio State University Drug Enforcement and Policy Center last week.

With a primary election in Ohio coming up next month, Brent said that “if we go against the people in the state of Ohio, I don’t expect any of us to get reelected because we are not going for what the people want.”

“I know sometimes people feel like they know best when it comes to people, but the people who know best is the people who got me here elected and the people who who voted” for legalization, she said.

Fifty-seven percent of Ohio voters passed a legalization measure at the ballot in November, but the Republican governor and GOP leadership has insisted that further changes to the law are needed, particularly as it concerns the timeline for legal sales.

Other proposed changes have proved more controversial, including a push from Gov. Mike DeWine (R) to use cannabis tax dollars to support law enforcement.

Brent said that “what we can do is we allocate this money and make sure that people have access to it, instead of giving all this money to police training.”

“It blows my mind—particularly how much money they want to put towards police training within the state—but particularly for hospital agencies which came out of the Senate. It to me is ridiculous,” she said. “People have told us time and time again when Issue 2 was passed what they want. All we’re doing right now is going against the people’s will.”

Keep reading

U.S. Navy Expands Marijuana Waiver Authority To Address Recruiting Shortfalls

Amid the U.S. military’s ongoing recruiting crisis, the Navy is expanding authority to grant waivers to recruits who arrive at boot camp and initially test positive for marijuana, instead of simply sending them home.

“If they fail that test and own up—’Yes, I smoke marijuana ‘—we do an evaluation of the young person to make sure there’s not something else going on,” Rear Adm. James Waters told reporters this week. “But we trust that through the process of boot camp that we have an opportunity to bring them along with our culture.”

Waters, who directs the Navy’s military personnel plans and policy division, explained that the goal of the change is to be “reflective of where legislation is in society.”

“We recognize that many states have legalized marijuana,” he said, according to the outlet Military.com.

As that publication notes, however, the policy shift is among a host of steps military officials across multiple branches have taken to address recruiting shortfalls in recent years across the armed forces. The changes have brought the current boot-camp dropout rate to about 10 percent, among the lowest in recent history.

If the Navy is going to meet its 2024 recruiting goal of bringing on 40,000 new sailors, Waters said, even losing 4,000 recruits during boot camp “is really, really unhelpful, and so we want to try to continue to work on that.”

The more lenient approach to failed drug tests is limited to initial screening for THC, Waters emphasized, noting that the policy does not apply to other drugs and adding: “We don’t do drugs in the military.”

The change comes shortly after a similar one was enacted at the Air Force, which reported late last year that it granted more than three times as many enlistment waivers to recruits who tested positive for THC as officials anticipated when they first expanded the waiver program in 2022.

The Air Force recently missed its annual recruitment goal for the first time since 1999, but Gen. Christopher Amrhein, the branch’s recruitment service commander, said last September that the situation could have been much worse if they hadn’t instituted the marijuana waiver policy.

In the first year since the waivers became available, the branch said it issued 165. That’s more than triple the 50 waivers it predicted it would grant annually. The policy covers both the Air Force and the Space Force.

For the Air Force in particular, this waiver program represents a notable development, as the branch instituted a policy in 2019 barring service members from using even non-intoxicating CBD, even if its derived from hemp and is therefore federally legal under the 2018 farm bill.

Keep reading

Idaho Lawmakers Want To Ban Marijuana Billboards Advertising Dispensaries In Neighboring Oregon

Idaho legislators introduced a bill on Wednesday to criminalize advertising illegal services or products—like marijuana—in Idaho.

Marijuana is illegal in Idaho and in federal law. But states surrounding Idaho, like Washington, Montana, Nevada and Oregon, have legalized marijuana for recreational use in recent years.

Rep. Judy Boyle, R-Midvale, told lawmakers on the House State Affairs Committee that there are advertisements for marijuana in Idaho, referencing a billboard in Idaho near the Idaho-Oregon border and newspaper advertisements shared by Rep. Heather Scott, who is from Blanchard in North Idaho near Washington.

“And then another individual sent me—actually on the internet—that you can have drugs delivered to your Idaho doorstep. So I thought this was a little outrageous,” Boyle told the committee.

Rep. Julianne Young, R-Blackfoot, said she saw a billboard advertising marijuana in downtown Boise.

Co-sponsored by Boyle and Sen. Chris Trakel, R-Caldwell, the bill would create a new section in Idaho state criminal law to allow misdemeanor charges for “any person who willfully publishes any notice or advertisement, in any medium, of a product or service that is illegal under Idaho law.”

Keep reading

Virginia Senators Unanimously Approve Bill To Prevent Marijuana From Being Used As Evidence Of Child Abuse

A Virginia Senate committee voted unanimously in favor of advancing a bill on Wednesday that would prevent the state from using marijuana alone as evidence of child abuse or neglect. The change is meant to protect parents and guardians from discrimination around cannabis use and possession, which the commonwealth legalized in 2021.

The Senate Courts of Justice Committee, voted 15–0 to report the measure, SB 115, which is sponsored by Senate President Pro Tempore Louise Lucas (D). If it becomes law, the measure would further provide that drug testing in child custody and visitation matters “shall exclude testing for any substance permitted for lawful use by an adult” under the state’s alcohol, cannabis and drug laws.

A person’s “lawful possession or consumption” of those substances, the bill says, “shall not serve as a basis to restrict custody or visitation unless other facts establish that such possession or consumption is not in the best interest of the child.”

According to a Department of Planning and Budget summary of the legislation, an enactment clause would direct the state Board of Social Services to amend its regulations, guidance documents and other materials to comply with the provisions of the bill.

The changes would incur no fiscal impact, the department’s statement says.

An identical measure, HB 833, passed the full House of Delegates in a 56–43 vote last month.

Chelsea Higgs Wise, of the advocacy group Marijuana Justice, which backed the bill, told Marijuana Moment she’s optimistic about its chances of being enacted. The governor’s administration gave suggestions last year, she said, which were taken into account along with feedback from the Senate committee.

The group also worked with Virginia NORML, which Wise said had reported that some medical marijuana patients had been impacted by the current law.

Keep reading

Maryland Senators Take Up Bills To Let Police Search Vehicles Based On Marijuana Odor And Protect Gun Rights For Cannabis Patients

Maryland senators took up two GOP-led marijuana bills on Friday: one that would let police search vehicles based on the smell of cannabis and another that’s meant to protect gun rights for medical marijuana patients.

Members of the Senate Judicial Proceedings Committee discussed the legislation during a hearing, listening to testimony in support and opposition, but did not vote on the proposals.

Sen. William Folden (R) is sponsoring the bill to authorize law enforcement searches based on marijuana odor, a measure he said attempts to “correct a wrong, an error, that the legislature made” when it passed reform legislation that was enacted last year to specifically prevent such searches given that the state has legalized marijuana.

If the smell of cannabis is emitted from a car, that’s a “strong indicator that person is in violation of law and potentially impaired at the time,” Folden said, adding that “this strong odor is definitely discernible by law enforcement and those in the community.”

Two county prosecutors also testified in favor of the measure. But drug policy reform advocates, including ACLU of Maryland Public Policy Director Yanet Amanuel, defended the current policy that bars police from conducting cannabis odor-based searches.

Keep reading

UFC Warns Fighters To Stop Using Marijuana ‘Immediately’ So They Aren’t Punished Under California Athletics Rules

The Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) might have removed marijuana from its banned substances list for professional fighters—but a California athletics commission says they could still face penalties under state rules for testing positive for THC over a certain limit ahead of an upcoming event.

UFC, which formally amended its cannabis drug testing policy last month, reportedly advised fighters that they could be subject to a $100 fine by the California State Athletic Commission if they test over 150 nanograms of THC per milliliter ahead of the UFC 298 event that is set to take place on February 17 in Anaheim.

An email from UFC that was obtained by the trade publication MMA Fighting cautioned fighters to “discontinue use immediately to ensure you don’t exceed” the THC threshold.

The policy from the California commission, which falls under the state Department of Consumer Affairs (DCA), might seem misplaced in light of UFC’s own recent reform, as well as the fact that marijuana is legal for adults in California.

Marijuana Moment reached out to DCA for comment, but a representative was not immediately available.

UFC itself said last month that while it models its list of prohibited drugs after the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA)—which has controversially maintained cannabis as a banned substance—it decided to make amendments “based on historical findings (i.e. marijuana removed from the prohibited list).”

Professional fighters were already largely protected from being penalized over testing positive for THC under a policy change that UFC adopted in 2021, but it has since removed cannabis as a banned drug altogether. The reform took effect on December 31, 2023.

Multiple sports organizations have moved to amend their marijuana testing policies for athletes amid the state legalization movement.

Keep reading

Biden Falsely Suggests Marijuana Pardons ‘Expunged’ Records And Released Prisoners While Campaigning On ‘Promises Kept’

President Joe Biden is again inflating the impact of his pardons for marijuana offenses, falsely suggesting that his act of clemency “expunged” records and that people were released from prison.

“A promise made and a promise kept,” he said during a campaign speech in South Carolina on Saturday.

“I keep my promises when I said no one—no one—should be in prison for merely possessing marijuana or using it, and their records should be expunged,” Biden said.

The president has routinely framed the mass cannabis pardon as an example of him fulfilling campaign pledges, but he’s also frequently misstated the practical effects of the action. A presidential pardon represents formal forgiveness from the government, but it does not expunge the record.

Several thousands of people have received the pardon for federal marijuana possession offenses under a pair of proclamations issued in 2022 and last month. The Justice Department has been distributing certificates to eligible people who apply for the largely symbolic document.

Keep reading