Illinois Will Revisit Hemp Regulation Debate Amid New Federal Ban On THC Products, Governor Says

“We’re going to have to look at how we might regulate” hemp “now that we see that the federal government is limiting it.”

By Brenden Moore, Capital News Illinois

Tucked into the spending legislation approved by Congress this week was a provision banning the sale of intoxicating hemp products—a move that could upend an industry with annual sales now into the billions.

Hemp was federally legalized under the 2018 Farm Bill, which defined it as a plant with less than 0.3 percent delta-9 THC. But the law didn’t account for total THC or other cannabinoids, creating a loophole that allowed companies to use compounds like delta-8 to make products with marijuana-like intoxicating effects. As a result, hemp-derived intoxicants have proliferated in gas stations, corner stores and other places with little to no regulation.

An amendment seeking to remove the language from the larger bill, proposed by Sen. Rand Paul, R-Kentucky, was rejected in a 76-24 vote. Sens. Dick Durbin (D-IL) and Tammy Duckworth (D-IL) voted with the majority.

Durbin said the hemp language was proposed by Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Kentucky.

“Throughout my career, I’ve tried my best to protect children,” Durbin said. “He asked for further regulation of the industry to make sure their products being sold at service stations and such weren’t dangerous to kids. That’s not too much to ask. I supported his position.”

Though he opposed the bill on the whole, the hemp provision hands Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker (D) an indirect political win. The governor earlier this year pushed in vain for legislation that would have limited the sale of delta-8 and other hemp-derived intoxicants to state-licensed cannabis dispensaries. But House Speaker Chris Welch, D-Hillside, did not call it for a vote, claiming it did not have the support of 60 House Democrats.

“In the absence of action in Springfield, Governor Pritzker supports policies to protect people, including children, from being misinformed or harmed by these products,” a Pritzker spokesperson said.

Pritzker further told reporters after an unrelated event in Chicago on Thursday that “we’re going to have to look at how we might regulate” hemp “now that we see that the federal government is limiting it.”

“The goal here is to keep our children safe,” Pritzker said. “That really is my number one goal about regulating intoxicating hemp—and when it’s available everywhere, and it’s got names like Skittlez with a ‘Z’ on the end, and it looks the same as Skittles the candy, it’s just not right.”

This article first appeared on Capitol News Illinois and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Capitol News Illinois is a nonprofit, nonpartisan news service that distributes state government coverage to hundreds of news outlets statewide. It is funded primarily by the Illinois Press Foundation and the Robert R. McCormick Foundation.

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Photo courtesy of Max Jackson.