Senate leadership has officially removed language from a major agriculture spending bill that would have banned hemp-derived THC products nationwide, following intense opposition from Senator Rand Paul (R-KY).
The now-scrapped provision was included in the version of the appropriations bill passed by the House earlier this month. It sought to close what critics call a regulatory loophole in the 2018 Farm Bill—authored by Senator Mitch McConnell—that has allowed a booming market of psychoactive hemp products to flourish without the same oversight as marijuana.
Paul, who represents hemp-producing Kentucky alongside McConnell, said the language would “destroy” the hemp industry and threatened to block the bill’s passage in the Senate. “We have hemp farmers in my state, and this language will destroy them,” Paul told reporters Monday.
Senator John Hoeven, the Republican chair of the Senate Appropriations subcommittee on Agriculture and the FDA, confirmed Tuesday that the hemp amendment was stripped from the final version due to the disagreement between McConnell and Paul. “We could never get agreement between the two,” Hoeven said.
The decision marks a major setback for those pushing to rein in the hemp-derived THC market, which has been criticized for circumventing state marijuana laws and evading regulations meant for licensed marijuana businesses. However, it’s a win for hemp industry stakeholders who argue that overregulation would threaten the viability of thousands of small businesses.
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