Marijuana Moment: Bipartisan Lawmakers Say Hemp THC Ban In Spending Bill Violates Congressional Rules, As They Prepare New Measure To Regulate Market

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Bipartisan House lawmakers are pushing back against attempts to ban hemp THC products, arguing that it would “deal a fatal blow” to the industry and, as currently included in a spending bill, violates congressional rules. To that end, the members say there are plans in the works to introduce an alternative measure to regulate the market.

In a letter sent to House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) on Friday, House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman James Comer (R-KY) and 26 other members said the appropriations legislation that’s advancing in the House with the hemp ban provisions intact would upend the industry that’s emerged since the crop was legalized under the 2018 Farm Bill.

While the Senate ultimately stripped similar language from its version of the agriculture spending measure following a procedural protest from Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), there’s still concern among stakeholders that it could wind up in the final package delivered to the president following bicameral negotiations.

If that were to happen, the lawmakers wrote that “it would deal a fatal blow to American farmers supplying the regulated hemp industry and small businesses, and jeopardize tens of billions of dollars in economic activity around the country.”

“Additionally, there are serious procedural concerns with how the language ended up in these bills,” they said. “This language has not been considered in a markup or hearing by any relevant authorizing committee and there was no public forum for members to express concerns with this language and preferred alternative legislation more appropriate for the relevant authorizing committees.”

Specifically, the letter says the inclusion of the hemp provisions in the House bill “clearly violates” a rule prohibiting language that changes existing law through general appropriations legislation.

“Perhaps most concerning is the characterization by proponents of this language that the bill will not negatively impact the industrial hemp industry,” it says, referring to comments from certain legislators such as Rep. Andy Harris (R-MD) and Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) who have championed the controversial proposal.

“On the contrary, it eliminates the existing and future development of dual cultivars used by farmers to produce grain and cannabinoids or fiber and cannabinoids,” the letter continues. “These genetic advances are critical to maximizing the economic value of a single crop, giving farmers the flexibility to respond to shifting market demands and improve overall profitability.”

“In short, the inherent interconnectedness of the grain, fiber and cannabinoid markets means the long-term success of American hemp farmers depends on the continued viability of all three markets. The hemp industry is not a collection of competing sectors, but an interconnected ecosystem where growth in one segment supports opportunity and innovation across the whole.”

Rather than pursue “this damaging appropriations rider,” the bipartisan members said Congress should enact regulations for consumable hemp that would prevent sales to people under 21, prohibit copycat products that resemble popular non-cannabis brands, standardize labeling requirements and mandate lab testing.

As noted in the letter, such legislation has previously been introduced in the Senate. It also says legislation is actively being drafted in the House Energy and Commerce Committee.

“By arbitrarily changing the definition of legal hemp rather than responsibly regulating the market, Congress is effectively turning out the lights on America’s legal hemp farmers and undermining the work being done by our colleagues in the authorizing committees and in states that have created regulatory frameworks for hemp products,” the letter says.

“For these reasons, we strongly urge leadership to remove this language from the FY26 Ag-FDA Appropriations bill and any final FY26 appropriations bill,” it concludes. “We will continue to stand up for American hemp farmers and small businesses and oppose efforts to include this language in any bill.”

Besides Comer, other signatories on the letter include Reps. Andy Barr (R-KY), Thomas Massie (R-KY), Nancy Mace (R-SC), Ted Lieu (D-CA), Dan Crenshaw (R-TX) and more.

Comer said in a press release with the U.S. Hemp Roundtable that he’s “witnessed firsthand the tremendous potential of industrial hemp to create quality jobs and meaningful economic opportunities for American workers and family farmers.”

“As Kentucky’s Commissioner of Agriculture, I spearheaded the state’s industrial hemp pilot program and continue to be a strong advocate for the hemp industry in Congress,” he said. “I’m fully committed to leading bipartisan efforts to urge House leadership to strip harmful language from the FY26 Ag-FDA bill—and any final appropriations package—that arbitrarily redefines legal hemp.”

Meanwhile, Democratic senators also sent a letter to leadership earlier this month that warned of the major upheaval that would happen in the hemp market if products containing any amount of THC were banned.

“Consumer safety and protecting kids while promoting opportunities for national economic growth in the hemp industry can and must go hand-in-hand,” Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR), who led that letter with Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR), said. “Congress needs to get serious about pursuing common-sense safeguards to protect kids and consumers and encourage innovation instead of a one-size-fits-all approach that hinders economic development and doesn’t keep kids safe.”

Dozens of hemp farmers from Kentucky also recently urged their state’s senior U.S. senator, McConnell, to back off from his push to recriminalize some products that are derived from their crops.

Paul, for his part, recently cautioned that the cannabis policy movement has “swung hard on the prohibitionist side” amid the ongoing debate over intoxicating hemp products. And he worries that, if things go awry, the hemp market could be decimated “within the next two weeks.”

Asked about recent conversations with McConnell and Harris, Paul said “we’ve been working diligently” with the staff “trying to reach a compromise.”

“A lot of the conversations have been constructive. They say, at least on the surface, they’re not trying to eliminate it—but I think we are, in some ways, talking past each other,” he said.

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Meanwhile, Paul recently filed a standalone bill that would go in the opposite direction of the hemp ban, proposing to triple the concentration of THC that the crop could legally contain, while addressing multiple other concerns the industry has expressed about federal regulations.

The senator introduced the legislation, titled the Hemp Economic Mobilization Plan (HEMP) Act, in June. It mirrors versions he’s sponsored over the last several sessions.

Harris, who championed the hemp THC ban in his chamber version of the agriculture spending legislation, told Marijuana Moment that he wasn’t concerned about any potential opposition to the hemp ban in the Senate—and he also disputed reports about the scope of what his legislation would do to the industry.

The Congressional Research Service (CRS) released a report in June stating that the legislation would “effectively” prohibit hemp-derived cannabinoid products. Initially it said that such a ban would prevent the sale of CBD as well, but the CRS report was updated to exclude that language for reasons that are unclear.

The hemp language is largely consistent with appropriations and agriculture legislation that was introduced, but not ultimately enacted, under the last Congress.

Hemp industry stakeholders rallied against that proposal, an earlier version of which was also included in the base bill from the subcommittee last year. It’s virtually identical to a provision of the 2024 Farm Bill that was attached by a separate committee last May via an amendment from Rep. Mary Miller (R-IL), which was also not enacted into law.

Photo courtesy of Brendan Cleak.

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