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Two bills filed in the Tennessee Legislature could significantly reshape the state’s hemp industry. One proposal, sponsored by Republican Rep. Ed Butler, seeks to ban smokable hemp flower products, including THCa flower, which when heated produces effects similar to marijuana.

Butler described the bill as a response to what he called a “public health crisis” stemming from intoxicating hemp products, which are widely available in common retail outlets and often marketed to children.

A second bill would transfer regulatory authority over intoxicating hemp sales to the Tennessee Alcoholic Beverage Commission (TABC). This measure would limit sales to age-restricted venues, ban online sales by retailers, and impose a wholesale tax of one cent per milligram on hemp products. Republican Sen. Richard Briggs, who introduced the measure, said the TABC is better equipped to enforce compliance, drawing on its experience regulating alcohol.

Industry shakeup looming?

If Butler’s ban passes, Tennessee’s hemp retailers may no longer sell smokable hemp products, including both psychoactive THCa flower and non-intoxicating CBD flower. Current state law, established in 2023, allowed THCa products through regulatory loopholes, complicating efforts to differentiate between legal hemp and illegal marijuana.

Law enforcement officials have described the situation as a challenge for policing. “Back in the day, if it looked like a duck, walked like a duck, then it was a duck,” Tommy Farmer, director of the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation’s Dangerous Drug Task Force told the Chattanooga Times Free Press. “With these changes in definitions, it turned everybody on their ears.”

Read more at Hemp Today

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