Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick (R) this week emphasised a survey consequence exhibiting that greater than half (55 %) of Texans need the state to rein its largely unregulated marketplace for hemp-derived THC. At the identical time, nevertheless, he appeared to disregard the survey’s different findings: that even more Texans want the state to legalize and regulate marijuana for each medical and grownup use.
“This is a huge polling number on the issue of banning THC,” Patrick stated Tuesday on social media, zeroing in on hemp-derived THC merchandise which can be extensively accessible throughout the state. “Texans see these stores everywhere: in their neighborhoods and especially around schools where children have easy access. People simply don’t want them around.”
“Once the facts are out in the open,” he continued, “there is no doubt these public polling numbers will rise as more Texans demand a ban on these dangerous products.”
Rather than an outright ban on THC, nevertheless, the broader outcomes of the University of Houston’s Hobby School of Public Affairs survey truly present that Texans need regulation of the psychoactive cannabinoid.
The polling discovered that almost 4 in 5 (79 %) assist legalizing the sale and use of medical marijuana with a physician’s advice, whereas greater than 3 in 5 (62 %) assist legalizing and regulating an adult-use hashish market.
Almost 7 in 10 (69 %), in the meantime, stated they suppose the state ought to decriminalize marijuana for private use.
There is bipartisan assist within the survey for every of the reforms.
What Patrick is correct about is that almost all Texans suppose legal guidelines round hashish want to vary: Only 22 % of these surveyed favored retaining the state’s marijuana legal guidelines as they’re.
Reform advocates have been fast to name out what some described as Patrick’s “cherry-picking” of the outcomes.
“It is beyond clear at this point that Texans want safe, legal access to regulated cannabis products and an end to criminal and civil penalties for responsible adult use,” Morgan Fox, political director for the advocacy group NORML, instructed Marijuana Moment.
“Ignoring this fact and focusing only on the data that supports regulating currently available cannabinoid products while ignoring the broader public health and criminal justice demands of Texas voters does a disservice to them and will ensure that the Lone Star State continues to fall behind on sensible cannabis policy,” he stated.
This is a large polling quantity on the problem of banning THC, proper out of the field. Texans see these shops in every single place: of their neighborhoods and particularly round colleges the place kids have easy accessibility. People merely don’t need them round.
Once our Senate hearings start, the… pic.twitter.com/q3V91Dvsmp
— Office of the Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick (@LtGovTX) February 4, 2025
Heather Fazio, of the Texas Cannabis Policy Center, echoed these sentiments, writing in an e mail that “now is the time to institute better regulations, rather than sending us back to an era of prohibition.”
“There’s certainly a need for improved regulations, like age restrictions, but this multibillion-dollar industry reflects free enterprise, not exploitation,” Fazio stated.
She additionally known as the survey query about banning THC “misleading” for suggesting that hemp merchandise are completely unregulated. “In fact, consumable products are regulated at the state and federal levels,” she stated.
Jeannette McKenzie of the Texas Cannabis Collective known as out the lieutenant governor for “cherry picking data without giving the full context,” which she stated quantities to “lying with statistics.”
“The lieutenant governor’s ban on THC is trying to convince us to move backwards when the rest of the country is moving forward,” she stated. “Texans have made clear what they want and even his misrepresentation of the study can’t hide the truth.”
(Disclosure: Fazio and Texas Cannabis Collective support Marijuana Moment’s work through pledges on Patreon.)
Another Texan—Betty Williams, of Texas NORML—instructed Marijuana Moment that when clients go into retailers to purchase hemp-derived THC, “Most of the time, they only read the back of the product, which ain’t made in Texas and has scant few information on it. This results in people not getting the information they want.”
“Texans want to be informed about what they are putting into our bodies,” Williams stated. “A regulated marijuana market with oversight and well-trained store [staff] would solve that problem easily.”
Another advocate, Kevin Caldwell, the southeast legislative supervisor for the group Marijuana Policy Project, stated that what Patrick highlighted in his put up “was that Texans are suspicious of the unregulated hemp market, and possibly rightfully so.”
“It is ironic that the Lt. Governor would allow his personal anti-cannabis bias to be on display by cherry-picking part of the poll to not reflect the reality that an overwhelming number of Texans want to see cannabis prohibition end,” Caldwell stated in an e mail, including: “Texas is surrounded by states with some form of access to cannabis products, and Lt. Gov. Patrick has been the main impediment to updating Texas’ antiquated cannabis policies.”
Patrick has focused hemp-derived THC repeatedly throughout his time in workplace, most just lately by together with laws that might ban the merchandise in his checklist of precedence payments. He’s endorsed laws that would ban all forms of consumable THC in the state.
The lieutenant governor additionally directed a Senate committee final yr to look at points round drinks containing THC and put together laws that might ban the sale of intoxicating hemp merchandise.
Other state officers, in the meantime, have known as for a extra complete strategy to hashish reform.
Earlier this yr, Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller (R) wrote an op-ed urging the state to each restrict intoxicating hemp products and expand its existing medical marijuana program to present entry to extra sufferers, writing: “Everyone who can benefit from it to help with their legitimate medical condition should have it available to them.”
Miller stated that he doesn’t personally assist adult-use marijuana legalization however argued it might nonetheless be preferable to the present scenario.
“Even if the legislature voted to legalize recreational marijuana tomorrow,” he stated, “that legislation would create a legal market with rules, guardrails, checks and balances. What we have now is the wild west.”
Photo courtesy of Philip Steffan.
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