Tennessee Bill Would Ban Smokable Hemp Flower Products

A new Tennessee proposal seeks to ban products containing smokable hemp flower, the Chattanooga Times Free Press reports. The bill would also move the sale of hemp products from convenience stores and gas stations to only age-restricted locations.

The bill’s sponsor, state Rep. Ed Butler (R), said that he filed the proposal in response to what he sees as a “public health crisis” caused by intoxicating hemp products.

The ban is aimed specifically at hemp flower products containing THCa — the Tennesse hemp industry’s most popular product, accounting for between 60% and 90% of hemp sales — but the proposal would likely dash all hemp flower sales, including non-psychoactive CBD products. “It would get rid of everything,” Josh Manning, the chief executive of Snapdragon Hemp in Chattanooga, said in the report.

Meanwhile, another proposal in Tennessee seeks to legalize and regulate adult-use cannabis products in the state, and a poll released last year found that 63% of Tennessee voters support adult-use legalization, including 53% of Republicans and 78% of Democrats.

Manning told the Times Free Press that he hopes lawmakers will choose to enact more significant cannabis reforms:

“There’s a lot of gas stations that don’t do things the right way. But at the end of the day, if we’re going to do this type of program, it needs to be done under a medical or a recreational program. Because this is kind of like recreational rules.” — Manning, in the report

In December, Tennessee state officials and city officials in Spring Hills agreed to pay a $735,000 settlement to two hemp companies after law enforcement seized their products without proper justification.