In a letter sent last week to the institution, Reps.
The group stressed in their letter that while marijuana remains federally illegal, cannabis plants with less than 0.3 percent THC are classified as hemp, which Congress legalized through the 2018 farm bill.
Hemp was grown by most of the Founders, and in 2018, George Washington’s Mount Vernon Estate harvested its first hemp crop since 1799,” they wrote.
Another factor that’s frustrating advocates is a more long-term concern: President Joe Biden opposes federal legalization, and his press secretary on Tuesday wouldn’t say whether he would sign or veto a reform bill if it’s sent to his desk.
“The legal cannabis industry in the United States produces about 150 million tons of waste each year.
The environmental impact of regulated marijuana has also been a point of interest for a leading conservationist group, the Sierra Club.
Mike Hopkins, R-Missoula, Republicans marshaled against the Senate amendments, which brought the bill closer to language in I-190, the ballot initiative voters passed last year to legalize adult-use marijuana.
“This is a bill that needs a couple of days’ more work,” said Rep.
Two, HB707 and HB670, came from lawmakers on the more conservative wing of the GOP, and taxed cannabis at a lower rate and avoided the investment in government programs that’s in both HB701 .
One, for example, restored the ability of municipal governments to levy a local-option excise tax on weed sales, an opportunity available in the first version of the bill but removed in the House.
Perhaps most significantly, environmental groups, several key backers of the original initiative and their various legislative allies clawed back some funding for Habitat Montana and other conservation programs that was in I-190 but largely not found in HB701.
House Republicans balked on the revival of the local option tax and the 20 percent tax rate on recreational marijuana in general, warning that it could create a black market and enable intrusions from a world atlas’ worth of different international cartels.
And they took issue with the HEART Fund spending and the boost for environmental programs. What appealed to them about House Bill 670, for example, was that it taxed marijuana at a lower rate, used some of the proceeds to pay down pension obligations and put the rest in a trust fund meant to address the downstream effects of legalization.
If they do nothing, I-190, which is already in statute, remains law, though how the litigation around its revenue allocations will proceed remains to be seen.
“I appreciate the discussion — but I feel like most of those objections are to I-190,” he said.
A Quinnipiac poll released this month found that 69 percent of all Americans now favor ending prohibition, an all-time high since Quinnipiac University began tracking the issue in 2012.
Dan Laughlin announced some details of the proposal earlier this year, though the bill has yet to be formally introduced.
On the House side, meanwhile, a handful of Democrats earlier this month introduced a separate bill, HB 1180, which would legalize the purchase and possession of marijuana by adults 21 and older.
Outside the legislature, Gov.
The governor has repeatedly called for legalization and pressured the Republican-controlled legislature to pursue the reform since coming out in favor of the policy in 2019.
Senate, previously led a listening tour across the state to solicit public input on legalization.
The COVID-19 pandemic, and its financial fallout, have also given lawmakers a reason to consider legalization, which make tens of millions of dollars in tax revenue.