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A GOP senator says he\u2019s hopeful that Congress will have a \u201cdiscussion\u201d about potentially creating a federal regulatory framework for marijuana in 2025, though he added that he personally wouldn\u2019t vote to federally legalize cannabis.<\/p>\n
At a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing focused on sports betting on Tuesday, Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) drew a parallel between state-level gambling and marijuana laws, arguing that the federal government has a responsibility to provide some level of regulatory oversight for both industries that are being legalized in a growing number of jurisdictions across the country.<\/p>\n
But that doesn\u2019t mean he\u2019d support legislation to make either sports better or cannabis federally legal, the senator said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI would never vote, as a matter of federal legislation, to legalize gambling at the federal level\u2014in the same way that I wouldn\u2019t for marijuana,\u201d Tillis said. However, he said states that have legalized either activity are effectively facilitating interstate commerce that warrants federal oversight.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf you\u2019re in a state that\u2019s not legalized, then you\u2019re naive if you don\u2019t think they\u2019re gambling\u2014in the same way that if you\u2019re in a state that doesn\u2019t have pot legal, then you\u2019re going to the Eastern Band of the Cherokee and buying pot that, for some reason, you can buy in western North Carolina,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The senator is referencing the fact that, while cannabis remains illegal in his state of North Carolina, the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians within the state\u2019s borders recently exercised its autonomy to legalize cannabis sales<\/a> in the tribe\u2019s jurisdiction.<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s not a legal place you can transport it out of the Eastern Band of the Cherokees boundary, for example. So maybe we need to start thinking about rules of the road,\u201d Tillis said<\/a>. \u201cI\u2019m kind of going on the pot angle, but on the gambling angle we need to get this right, or it\u2019s going to get worse, and the bad actors are going to exploit more.\u201d<\/p>\n Watch the senator\u2019s remarks on cannabis and gambling policy, starting at 1:05:10 into the video below:<\/strong><\/p>\n The senator said there\u2019s a \u201cpretty substantial correlation between states who have legalized marijuana and states who are legalizing sports betting,\u201d and the \u201cchallenge that we have is we have a patchwork of laws now around the marijuana trade, and we have a patchwork of laws around the sports betting trade.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cSo it really raises the question of, how can we get to a place where, when a market exists and it has persisted for thousands and thousands of years\u2014a gambling market\u2014how do we make it safe?\u201d Tillis said. \u201cHow do we address the negative consequences which will invariably occur? And how do we resource the various agencies to make sure that we can do that?\u201d<\/p>\n While the senator\u2019s point was about negating potential harms from gambling, he\u2019s made several comments over recent months about his similar feelings as it applies to marijuana laws.<\/p>\n Last month, for example, he said\u00a0marijuana rescheduling and industry banking legislation are \u201chalf-assed measures,\u201d and lawmakers should instead focus on creating a federal regulatory framework for cannabis<\/a> similar to alcohol and tobacco.<\/p>\n \u201cWe probably need to look at a federal comprehensive framework to deal with the banking issues and scheduling issues,\u201d Tillis said at the time. \u201cBut I think, in my opinion, we need a federal regimen that\u2019s not unlike what we have for tobacco and alcohol, where you authenticate the crops on the front end, you mandate flavorings and delivery methods through the FDA and you allow banking.\u201d<\/p>\n Without creating \u201cone consistent framework\u201d for marijuana, \u201cwe\u2019re dancing around the issue,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Don Murphy, a cannabis lobbyist and former GOP Maryland legislator who attended Tuesday\u2019s committee hearing and briefly spoke with the senator, said it was \u201cencouraging to hear Senator Tillis telegraph a comprehensive hearing on cannabis especially considering his comment about the SAFE Banking Act being a \u2018half-assed\u2019 measure.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cHis statement also suggests cannabis policy is on the GOP\u2019s radar, even among those members who have been less than supportive in the past,\u201d Murphy said.<\/p>\n Tillis previously discussed his support for creating a federal regulatory scheme for marijuana<\/a>\u00a0in an interview with Green Market Report in July, affirming that there should be a framework that \u201ctreats marijuana just like tobacco.\u201d<\/p>\n \u2014 Despite his position, in April Tillis joined Sen. Ted Budd (R-NC) in asking federal, state and local officials what\u00a0steps they were taking to enforce marijuana prohibition<\/a> as the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians prepared to launch recreational cannabis sales on its lands within North Carolina.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, back in 2017, Tillis also teamed up with bipartisan colleagues on a bill that was meant to\u00a0ease researchers\u2019 access to marijuana for studies on its medical benefits<\/a>\u00a0and require the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) to develop recommendations for good manufacturing practices for growing and producing cannabis for research.<\/p>\n DEA Judge Says Agency Made A Critical \u2018Blunder\u2019 In Attempt To Force FDA Officials To Testify At Marijuana Rescheduling Hearings<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n Photo courtesy of Chris Wallis \/\/ Side Pocket Images.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n The post GOP Senator Wants Congress To Have A \u2018Discussion\u2019 About Marijuana Next Year, But Says He Won\u2019t Vote For Legalization<\/a> appeared first on Marijuana Moment<\/a>.<\/p>\n
A GOP senator says he\u2019s hopeful that Congress will have a \u201cdiscussion\u201d about potentially creating a federal regulatory framework for marijuana in 2025, though he added that he personally wouldn\u2019t vote to federally legalize cannabis. At a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing focused on sports betting on Tuesday, Sen. Thom TillisContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":458,"featured_media":79461,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[18,81,126],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79460"}],"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\/458"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=79460"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79460\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":79462,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79460\/revisions\/79462"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/79461"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=79460"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=79460"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=79460"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n\n\n\ufeff<\/span>\ufeff<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\nRead More: GOP Senator Wants Congress To Have A \u2018Discussion\u2019 About Marijuana Next Year, But Says He Won\u2019t Vote For Legalization<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"