Imagine what the courts will be like come November (maybe December?)
Those AG’s who just wrote that letter will be drowning if the US hemps sector starts responding aggressively
The Texas Tribune
On Friday, two hemp retailers and a distributor filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas against the Texas Department of State Health Services; Attorney General Ken Paxton; and the Galveston County criminal district attorney and sheriff, alleging that classifying hemp-derived substances as illegal violates the 2018 Farm Bill, which removed it from the federal Controlled Substances Act.
The complaint states that the reinstated definitions provide no delineation between lawful hemp and unlawful marijuana; that it’s preempted by the 2018 Farm Bill’s protections for the interstate hemp market; and that these classifications impose an unconstitutional burden on interstate commerce.
In addition to the complaint, the plaintiffs are also moving for a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction to prevent the ban on these THC products.
“For more than seven years, Texans have built a multibillion-dollar hemp industry under laws that define these products as legal hemp. Without any change to those laws, the State now says they’re Schedule I drugs, like heroin,” said Andrea Steel, lead counsel for the hemp industry in this case, in a news release
State officials banned at the end of last month several hemp-derived THC cannabis products, including those containing delta-8 and delta-10 THC variants, punishing people in possession of them with jail time and fines. However, delta-9 THC, the most commonly sold THC product in Texas, will remain legal.
Now that THC variants are classified as a schedule I drug, possession of illegal THC products will be treated as a state jail felony, which carries a punishment of 180 days to two years in prison and fines of up to $10,000, say cannabis experts.
“Our Constitution does not allow the government to jail a person under a framework no one can make sense of – our clients are asking the federal court to protect Texans from their own confused government,” Steel said.
Cannabis experts say if the ban is not removed, more than half of the THC products in stores might be removed from shelves.
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