{"id":52200,"date":"2022-01-07T05:19:33","date_gmt":"2022-01-07T13:19:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/2022\/01\/07\/mississippi-senator-brings-hemp-to-governors-office-to-demonstrate-medical-marijuana-bill-possession-limits\/"},"modified":"2022-01-07T13:45:36","modified_gmt":"2022-01-07T21:45:36","slug":"mississippi-senator-brings-hemp-to-governors-office-to-demonstrate-medical-marijuana-bill-possession-limits","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/2022\/01\/07\/mississippi-senator-brings-hemp-to-governors-office-to-demonstrate-medical-marijuana-bill-possession-limits\/","title":{"rendered":"Mississippi Senator Brings Hemp To Governor\u2019s Office To Demonstrate Medical Marijuana Bill Possession Limits"},"content":{"rendered":"<\/p>\n

\u201cI took samples to show him what an ounce actually looks like\u2014what 3.5 grams actually looks like.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

By Nick Judin, Mississippi Free Press<\/strong><\/p>\n

Medical marijuana, income tax reform, legislative redistricting, teacher pay, the rebuilding of the ballot initiative process and more than $1.6 billion in federal funds from the American Rescue Plan Act waiting for appropriation are high on the agenda of the 2022 Mississippi legislative session. As they returned on January 4, lawmakers faced a massive slate of priorities and a limited window in which to accomplish them.<\/p>\n

Looming above it all is the ongoing omicron surge, the most infectious stage of the pandemic thus far. The day the session gaveled in, the Mississippi State Department of Health was recording 6,592 new cases of COVID-19, blowing through August\u2019s peak of 5,048.<\/p>\n

Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann (R) was the first high-profile infection of the legislative session, showing up to gavel in only a day before testing positive, potentially exposing numerous legislators, capitol workers and most of the capitol press corps. Hosemann, who previously tested positive in an earlier legislative outbreak and is fully vaccinated, is having an asymptomatic case.<\/p>\n

Of all the priorities in the near future for the short session, none has been more comprehensively discussed, tweaked, debated and recalibrated than the state\u2019s long-awaited medical-marijuana plan. With a supportive majority across both the House and Senate, only Gov. Tate Reeves\u2019s (R) opposition threatens the plan\u2019s adoption<\/a>.<\/p>\n

One Last Meeting with Governor<\/h2>\n

Medical marijuana, which voters approved in 2020<\/a> before the entire ballot initiative process was overturned<\/a> in 2021, is expected to be an early priority of the Legislature. After months of legwork, including hearings, meetings and private conversations between legislators, limited room to negotiate on the details of the proposal remains.<\/p>\n

Wednesday afternoon, Sen. Kevin Blackwell (R), who is the architect of the medical-marijuana bill on the Senate side, had a final meeting with Gov. Reeves to come to an agreement on the bill\u2019s last details. Reeves\u2019s opposition to the plan has evolved from vague distaste to the promise of a veto if the bill approves medical-marijuana recipients for the currently planned amount of marijuana.<\/p>\n

\u201cI believe 11 joints a day, every day, for everyone with a MJ card is too much! And I believe the potential of 100,000,000 joints PER MONTH on the streets is more of a recreational program,\u201d the governor wrote on social media in late December.<\/p>\n

In an interview with the Mississippi Free Press, Blackwell described the meeting as cordial, but acknowledged that neither party was inclined to budge on the biggest issues. \u201cI thought it went well. [The governor] was receptive, appreciative of the meeting. Hopefully we moved the bar a little bit closer to an agreement,\u201d Blackwell said. \u201cHe was non-committal, so they\u2019re going to think about what we said and get back with us.\u201d<\/p>\n

Niceties aside, the legislative proposal thus far isn\u2019t buckling under the governor\u2019s pressure. \u201cWe\u2019ve presented what we thought was reasonable,\u201d Blackwell said. \u201cThe amount has not changed. It\u2019s still four ounces [per month] right now.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Legislature\u2019s proposal, which is intended to fill in for the broadly worded Initiative 65, allows physicians with a \u201cbona-fide practitioner-patient relationship\u201d to certify patients for cannabis. These cannabis certifications provide for the purchase of medical cannabis in various forms, including smokables. Reeves, who previously indicated that agreement between the House and Senate would be sufficient for a 2021 special session to pass the bill, wants deeper restrictions on the amount of marijuana provided to patients.<\/p>\n

Blackwell told the Mississippi Free Press that he hoped Mississippi\u2019s additional safeguards against recreational use of the medical-marijuana product would convince Reeves that the current limits on supply would be sufficient.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe talked about the differences between what he has portrayed as being Oklahoma\u2019s bill\u2026to the things that we\u2019ve done, what we\u2019ve put in place, the safeguards which Oklahoma didn\u2019t have,\u201d he said. \u201cThey didn\u2019t have a seed-to-sale tracking system. I don\u2019t believe there\u2019s any cap on the [qualifying] diagnoses, we have, I think, 28 debilitating diagnoses.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cCounties and municipalities can opt out of the program,\u201d Blackwell added. \u201cWe\u2019ve gotten so many [safeguards] in place.\u201d<\/p>\n

Blackwell says he brought physical samples of hemp, which is legal, to the meeting for the governor to examine. \u201cI took samples to show him what an ounce actually looks like\u2014what 3.5 grams actually looks like.\u201d<\/p>\n

Governor\u2019s Veto Ahead?<\/h2>\n

Whether the appeal moves the governor or not may be more relevant than legislative backers of the plan would hope. \u201cWe have the votes to get it through,\u201d Blackwell said, meaning the majority necessary to send the bill to the governor. \u201cDo we have the votes to override a veto<\/a>? I don\u2019t know. That\u2019s a topic of discussion for another day.\u201d<\/p>\n

Diplomatic as his conversation with the governor may have been, Blackwell seemed confident that the Legislature had done its part, collectively, to create a satisfactory bill.<\/p>\n

\u201cLee Yancey\u2019s been great. Speaker [Philip Gunn] and Jason White have been great. It has been an eye-opening experience to go through a bill of this nature. I don\u2019t know if any bill has been vetted like this\u2026with the transparency that\u2019s occurred,\u201d Blackwell said in an earlier interview.<\/p>\n

For medical marijuana, Lt. Gov. Hosemann now holds the ball, set to assign the bill to the relevant committee as he recovers from his second case of COVID-19. Blackwell explained that the bill would pass to the Public Health Committee, where Sen. Hob Bryan (D) would shepherd it to the Senate floor.<\/p>\n

In a Wednesday interview, Bryan told the Mississippi Free Press that he wouldn\u2019t be a roadblock in the process, intending to pass it along to the floor as quickly as he could. \u201cAssuming a bill is introduced, and assuming it comes to public health\u2026I would call the meeting as soon as is reasonably practical,\u201d Bryan said.<\/p>\n

Blackwell asserted that none of the tweaks remaining in the bill would delay its committee assignment. Assuming coronavirus does not further delay the session, which is unknown, a Senate floor vote in the next week seems likely.<\/p>\n

This story was first published by Mississippi Free Press.<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

\n

Top Kansas Democrats Unveil Plan To Put Medical And Adult-Use Marijuana Legalization On The 2022 Ballot<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

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The post Mississippi Senator Brings Hemp To Governor\u2019s Office To Demonstrate Medical Marijuana Bill Possession Limits<\/a> appeared first on Marijuana Moment<\/a>.<\/p>\n


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\u201cI took samples to show him what an ounce actually looks like\u2014what 3.5 grams actually looks like.\u201d By Nick Judin, Mississippi Free Press Medical marijuana, income tax reform, legislative redistricting, teacher pay, the rebuilding of the ballot initiative process and more than $1.6 billion in federal funds from the AmericanContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":457,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[18,81],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52200"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/457"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=52200"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52200\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":52201,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52200\/revisions\/52201"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=52200"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=52200"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=52200"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}