Gov. Kristi Noem vetoed a hemp legalization bill during the 2019 legislative session and lawmakers immediately got to work to prepare another bill for next year’s session. However, in a move that sets the governor on a collision course with legislators, Noem has vowed to veto any such bill once it gets to her desk.
The push to legalize hemp this year in South Dakota was just a few votes shy of the support needed to override the governor’s veto, and an 11-member committee of legislators immediately went to work to study the hemp laws of other states, such as Kentucky, which haven’t legalized any form of marijuana (recreational or medical).
The committee is also working to find answers to the 315 questions that the governor raised regarding her concerns on legalizing industrial hemp.
However, committee members say that while the governor raises some legitimate questions about hemp, she doesn’t appear to be willing to listen to any answers that are given to those questions.
For example, the committee members say that even if the governor sent them the 315 questions, she hasn’t personally tried to work with the committee to find answers to those questions.
Instead, Gov. Kristi Noem has sent state employees to engage with the committee and those secretaries aren’t putting in the effort to interact with their counterparts in states where hemp is already legal in order to learn what it has been like in those jurisdictions.
Furthermore, Gov. Noem has taken to national media to voice her resistance to the legalization of hemp saying that it is a Trojan horse through which pro-marijuana advocates want to sneak marijuana onto the law books of the state.
Gov. Noem continues that the legalization of hemp will indirectly legalize marijuana in South Dakota, and that is an outcome she isn’t willing to witness on her watch.
She says that while there is a current wave to legalize recreational marijuana across the country, a time is coming when there will be pushback and a wave in a different direction will begin. She wants South Dakota to be the state that remains as the “control” during the country’s “marijuana experiment.”
The lawmakers in favor of legalizing hemp assert that no one is interested in legalizing marijuana, but since both sides seem to have such strong views about the hemp issue, a showdown is set to take place between the governor on the one hand and the lawmakers, including those in the governor’s party, on the other side.
Analysts believe hemp industry actors like Earth Science Tech Inc. (OTCQB: ETST) and Geyser Brands Inc. (TSX.V: GYSR) must be wishing that if only the two sides could listen to each other, a compromise could be reached sooner.
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