Tag: republicans

GOP Leaders Blocked Schumer’s Push To Include Marijuana Banking Reform In Government Funding Bill, Senate Source Says

Republican House and Senate leadership “openly and solely blocked” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer’s (D-NY) attempt to include bipartisan marijuana banking legislation in a government funding bill, a Senate source familiar with the negotiations tells Marijuana Moment.

As bicameral lawmakers have worked to put together a continuing resolution to keep the government funded, Schumer repeatedly urged colleagues across the aisle to incorporate the Secure and Fair Enforcement Regulation (SAFER) Banking Act, to no avail. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) and House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) killed that prospective deal, the source said.

“Schumer pushed for SAFER Banking at the negotiation table in the CR multiple times. This week, both Speaker Johnson and Leader McConnell strongly rejected it,” they said. “For years some Republicans have done a dance telling marijuana businesses that they supported SAFER, while Republican leadership has openly and solely blocked it at every turn.”

Marijuana Moment reached out to Johnson’s and McConnell’s offices for comment, but representatives were not immediately available.

The majority leader said following the election that he remained committed to moving the SAFER Banking Act during the lame duck session, and that he was eyeing the must-pass stopgap funding legislation to get that done.

Schumer could in theory still put the cannabis banking bill on the floor for Senate consideration as a standalone measure. But even if it did pass with the steep 60-vote threshold to overcome a filibuster in the chamber, the thinking is that it wouldn’t be worth the effort considering Johnson’s obstinance and unlikeliness to bring it to a vote in the House, the Senate source said.

Last month, Sen. Steve Daines (R-MT), the GOP lead sponsor of the SAFER Banking Act, told Politico that he wanted to see the measure “get done before the end of the year.” Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) separately said he’s “hoping to get something done” on cannabis banking through the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), but that prospect is similarly in doubt.

Notably, a Republican senator, Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC), told AskAPol that he considers the SAFER Banking Act a “half-assed” measure that should simply be incorporated into legislation to create a comprehensive federal regulatory framework for marijuana.

Getting the banking reform enacted during the lame duck could be pivotal following last month’s election that put Republicans back in the Senate majority at the same time that they held onto the House. Sen. John Thune (R-SD) was elected by his peers to serve as majority leader, and he’s opposed to the cannabis banking bill, further complicating its pathway to passage under the next Congress.

Keep reading

Top Ohio Lawmaker Wants To Restrict Marijuana Homegrow Rights And Strengthen THC Potency Caps

Republican lawmakers in Ohio are once again aiming to scale back parts of the state’s voter-approved marijuana legalization law, looking to a proposal from last year that would have decreased allowable THC levels in state-legal cannabis products, reduced the number of plants that adults can grow at home and increased costs for consumers at dispensaries.

Those provisions, backed by Senate President Matt Huffman (R), were added to separate House legislation last year and passed by the Senate. House lawmakers ultimately blocked the Senate changes, however, with some members emphasizing the importance of protecting the will of voters, who passed the legalization law on a 53–47 margin in November 2023.

Come next month, however, Huffman will take over as speaker of the House, having won a seat in last month’s election and subsequently being chosen for the leadership role by colleagues. The move is widely expected to give Huffman new power to push his marijuana proposal forward.

“There were some fundamental flaws in the initiative that was introduced and passed by the voters, which you usually have when there’s not a vetting from all sides,” Huffman told reporters last week about the voter-approved marijuana law. “The bill that the Senate passed last December addresses many of those things.”

Initially, changes backed by Hoffman would have eliminated home cultivation rights entirely for Ohio adults and criminalized all cannabis obtained anywhere other than a state-licensed retailer. Those amendments would have also reduced the marijuana possession limit, raised sales tax on cannabis purchases and diverted funding away from social equity programs and toward law enforcement.

Keep reading

Texas Should Ban All THC Products—Including Delta-8—In 2025, Lieutenant Governor Says

Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick (R) announced Wednesday that lawmakers in the state Senate would move to ban all forms of consumable tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC, in Texas.

Patrick, who presides over the Senate and largely controls the flow of legislation in the chamber, said the THC ban would be designated as Senate Bill 3—a low bill number that signals it is among his top priorities for the upcoming legislative session.

The Republican-controlled Legislature was widely expected to take aim at Texas’s booming hemp market, which has proliferated with thousands of cannabis dispensaries since lawmakers authorized the sale of consumable hemp in 2019.

That law, passed one year after hemp was legalized nationwide, was intended to boost Texas agriculture by permitting the commercialization of hemp containing trace amounts of non-intoxicating delta-9 THC. But Patrick contends the law has been abused by retailers using loopholes to market products with unsafe levels of THC, including to minors.

“Dangerously, retailers exploited the agriculture law to sell life-threatening, unregulated forms of THC to the public and made them easily accessible,” Patrick said in a statement announcing the measure late Wednesday. “Since 2023, thousands of stores selling hazardous THC products have popped up in communities across the state, and many sell products, including beverages, that have three to four times the THC content which might be found in marijuana purchased from a drug dealer. ”

Texas has not legalized marijuana in any form for broad use.

Keep reading

Nebraska Judge Rejects Officials’ Move To Amend Medical Marijuana Ballot Challenges She Has Already Dismissed

A Lancaster County District Court judge has overruled two final attempts to amend legal challenges against Nebraska’s two medical cannabis petitions.

In a five-page order Thursday morning, District Judge Susan Strong denied requests from John Kuehn (R), a former state senator and former State Board of Health member who brought the initial lawsuit, and Nebraska Secretary of State Bob Evnen (R) to amend their complaints.

Strong said the amendments would not affect the outcome of the lawsuit that she had already dismissed last week, and for which she had already anticipated the legal arguments.

The dismissal upheld the ballot certification of two measures from the Nebraskans for Medical Marijuana campaign to legalize and regulate the drug. Voters passed the two measures, and state constitutional officers certified those election results Monday, including Evnen and Attorney General Mike Hilgers (R), whose office defended Evnen in the Kuehn-led lawsuit.

The medical cannabis laws to legalize and regulate the drug are set to take effect by December 12.

Keep reading

Florida Republican Lawmaker Introduces Legislation to BAN Weather Engineering Amid Rising Concerns Over Climate Manipulation

A Florida Republican Senator has introduced SB 56, a bill that aims to prohibit weather modification activities within the state.

Introduced by Senator Ileana Garcia, this legislation targets chemical and technological methods used to manipulate weather patterns, temperature, or sunlight intensity, effectively halting a controversial practice often linked to geoengineering.

What Does SB 56 Say?

The bill repeals existing provisions in Florida statutes related to weather modification.

It specifically prohibits the “injection, release, or dispersion, by any means, of 36 a chemical, a chemical compound, a substance, or an apparatus 37 into the atmosphere within the borders of this state for the 38 express purpose of affecting the temperature, the weather, or 39 the intensity of sunlight.”

Violators could face stiff penalties, including fines of up to $10,000 and potential misdemeanor charges.

SB 56 is set to take effect on July 1, 2025, but it will likely encounter opposition from industry stakeholders and environmental scientists.

Florida is not the only state taking a stand against weather manipulation. Earlier this year, the Tennessee State Senate took a definitive stance against the controversial topic of “chemtrails” by passing SB 2691/HB 2063.

The bill, which aims to ban the intentional release of chemicals into the atmosphere for geoengineering purposes, was sponsored by Representative Monty Fritts (R-Kingston) and Senator Steve Southerland (R-Morristown) and won approval in the Senate on Monday, The Tennessean reported.

The legislation is predicated on the claim that “it is documented the federal government or other entities acting on the federal government’s behalf or at the federal government’s request may conduct geoengineering experiments by intentionally dispersing chemicals into the atmosphere, and those activities may occur within the State of Tennessee.”

This new bill seeks to outlaw any such activities, stating that, “The intentional injection, release, or dispersion, by any means, of chemicals, chemical compounds, substances, or apparatus within the borders of this state into the atmosphere with the express purpose of affecting temperature, weather, or the intensity of the sunlight is prohibited.”

In New Hampshire, two motivated House Representatives, Jason Gerhard, Merrimack – District 25, and Kelley Potenza, Strafford – District 19, have introduced “The Clean Atmosphere Preservation Act” NH House Bill (HB) 1700.

Keep reading

Every GOP Senate Majority Leader Candidate Opposes Marijuana Legalization

With Republicans winning control of the U.S. Senate in last week’s elections, a key question for marijuana reform advocates and stakeholders is what the selection of a new GOP majority leader will mean for cannabis reform.

There are three names currently at the top of the list of potential majority leaders who will set the legislative agenda: Sens. John Cornyn (R-TX), Rick Scott (R-FL) and John Thune (R-SD). None have embraced ending prohibition, and each has a track record of expressing concerns about cannabis use or even moderate policy reforms such as those endorsed by President-elect Donald Trump on the campaign trail.

With Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) having already announced he will not be seeking to return to the leadership position, this will the first time since 2007 that the GOP caucus will be selecting a new majority leader. Republican senators are set to meet on Wednesday to make that determination.

Trump hasn’t endorsed a specific candidate to assume the top Senate role, but while Thune is generally considered a front-runner, certain of the president-elect’s allies such as Elon Musk have been pushing for Scott to become the chamber’s leader.

However it shakes out, the current contenders are united in their opposition to legalizing marijuana.

There are some in the industry who remain hopeful that Trump’s embrace of an unsuccessful Florida legalization measure, cannabis banking reform and rescheduling could move the party to fall in line. But the extent to which the incoming president cares enough about the issue to forcefully push for, or even occasionally mention, it from the White House remains to be seen.

After announcing his support for the policy change, Trump became relatively quiet on the issue ahead of the election—which may partly explain why his supporters evidently did not adopt his position, according to a recent poll.

And based on the records of the top contenders for Senate majority leader, it seems highly unlikely they would proactively try to enact reform legislation without a major push from the president.

Keep reading

Marijuana Legalization Faces A ‘Red Wall’ In Remaining Conservative States That Still Criminalize Consumers

November 5, 2024, was a tough day for cannabis legalization supporters.

Recreational legalization ballot questions in Florida, North Dakota and South Dakota all failed.

Two medical measures passed in Nebraska but face legal challenges over the validity of the signatures required to get the measures on the ballot. Why two measures? One legalizes the medical use of cannabis, and the second regulates it.

A medical use measure also appeared on the ballot in Arkansas, but the state Supreme Court ruled before the election that the votes can’t be counted because the title and name were “misleading.”

These failures raise questions about where the movement to legalize cannabis goes from here.

The red wall holds

I’ve been researching cannabis legalization in the U.S. since 2014. I’ve previously written about how the cannabis legalization movement’s primary obstacle is the “red wall,” a term I use to refer to the 20 states where Republicans have total control of state government and recreational cannabis remains illegal.

Another four states without recreational legalization—Kansas, Wisconsin, Kentucky and North Carolina—could be described as “red wall adjacent.” These states have Democratic governors, but Republicans control the state legislatures.

Keep reading

Ohio Would Ban Intoxicating Hemp Product Sales Under GOP Senator’s New Bill

State Sen. Steve Huffman, R-Tipp City, introduced a bill that would ban the sale of intoxicating hemp products in Ohio.

The Republican lawmaker introduced Senate Bill 326 on Thursday. State lawmakers are set to return to the Ohio Statehouse next week for the start of lame duck.

S.B. 326 defines intoxicating hemp products as containing more than 0.5 of a milligram of delta-9 THC per serving, two milligrams of delta-9 THC per package, or 0.5 of a milligram of total non-delta-9 THC per package, according to the bill’s language.

“This act is hereby declared to be an emergency measure necessary for the immediate preservation of the public peace, health, and safety,” the bill said. “The reason for such necessity is to protect Ohioans, especially Ohio’s youth, from untested, unregulated dangerous tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) products. Therefore, this act shall go into immediate effect.”

Marijuana, which is legal in Ohio, is not included as an intoxicating hemp product, according to the bill’s language. Ohio recreational marijuana sales recently topped $143.4 million since sales started three months ago, according to the the Ohio Department of Commerce Division of Cannabis Control.

The 2018 Farm Bill says hemp can be grown legally if it contains less than 0.3 percent THC. Intoxicating hemp products can come in many forms including edibles, beverages, vaping cartridges or oils, among other things.

Delta-9 THC is the main naturally occurring intoxicating part of the cannabis plant and people typically experience a high after consuming or smoking delta-9 THC beyond a certain threshold.

Under S.B. 326, the Ohio Investigative Unit would enforce this piece of legislation if it were to become law, with the assistance of the Ohio Department of Public Safety.

The Ohio Department of Commerce Director (who is currently Sheryl Maxfield) could impose an administrative penalty against someone who sells intoxicating hemp products—$10,000 for a first violation, $25,000 for a second violation and $50,000 for a third violation.

Violating the proposed law would be a first degree misdemeanor on a first offense and a fifth degree felony for a second offense, according to the bill’s language. It would be a fifth degree felony if someone sold intoxicating hemp to someone under 21.

Keep reading

House Judiciary GOP Exposes Kamala Harris’s Open-Borders Alliance with United Nations Bureaucrats: $81.7 Million in U.S. Taxpayer Funds Spent to Facilitate Direct Flights for Illegal Aliens into America

The House Judiciary GOP has exposed what they call an “open-borders alliance” between the Biden-Harris Administration and United Nations bureaucrats that uses U.S. taxpayer dollars to enable illegal immigration.

The findings reveal that at least $81.7 million in taxpayer funds have been allocated to foreign nationals employed by the U.N., who advise migrants on ways to enter the United States.

This funding has established “migration centers” across Central and South America, facilitating nearly 70,000 aliens with potential resettlement options in the U.S.

According to the report, since 2021, the Biden-Harris Administration has overseen the release of nearly 5.8 million illegal immigrants into the U.S., with an additional 1.9 million entering as “gotaways” who evaded apprehension entirely.

The GOP committee argues that these numbers illustrate an administration bent on dismantling border security. Instead of fixing the problem, the administration has created a workaround through the Safe Mobility Initiative—a program designed to “avoid the optics of border crossings” by coordinating with U.N. agents in 13 Central and South American cities.

The program’s Safe Mobility Offices (SMOs), funded by U.S. taxpayer dollars, assist aliens in bypassing the southwest border altogether.

Foreign nationals from the International Organization for Migration (IOM) and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) counsel migrants on various ways to enter the United States, including through family reunification and “labor pathways.”

Only 14% of SMO staff are American citizens, with the rest advising migrants at U.S. taxpayers’ expense. Since the initiative’s launch, 18,000 aliens have reportedly been resettled in the U.S., and thousands more are lined up for entry through alternative pathways.

Keep reading