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Court challenges loom for new NJ cannabis law
Clip: 9/17/2024 | 4m 59sVideo has Closed Captions
Law prohibits unlicensed NJ merchants from selling hemp-infused products
Under a new law, unlicensed New Jersey merchants have one month to clear store shelves of intoxicating hemp-infused products, including candy-flavored gummies, smokable hemp flower and popular beverages.
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NJ Spotlight News is a local public television program presented by THIRTEEN PBS
NJ Spotlight News
Court challenges loom for new NJ cannabis law
Clip: 9/17/2024 | 4m 59sVideo has Closed Captions
Under a new law, unlicensed New Jersey merchants have one month to clear store shelves of intoxicating hemp-infused products, including candy-flavored gummies, smokable hemp flower and popular beverages.
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Learn Moreabout PBS online sponsorshipIn our spotlight on Business Report tonight, New Jersey has new rules to crack down on hemp products sold in the state after Governor Murphy late last week signed off on a contentious US law limiting the marketing and sales of Delta eight and other hemp infused substances.
Supporters say the law closes a loophole that allowed so-called gas station weed to be sold unregulated, sometimes ending up in the hands of kids.
But others argue the regulations will put the legal hemp industry out of business.
Senior correspondent Brenda Flanagan has the latest.
Unlicensed New Jersey merchants have one month to clear store shelves of intoxicating hemp and used products, including candy flavored gummies.
Smokable hemp, flower and popular beverages spiked with a cannabinoid THC that's required under a controversial law just signed by Governor Murphy.
As New Jersey's Cannabis Regulatory Commission draws up new rules to license what critics call gas station weed, they.
Get a box of stuff they put on the shelves and they sell to kids.
There's no regulatory process for that.
So that's the first and foremost.
What do we do to ensure public safety?
The biggest win here for families is in communities in the state of New Jersey.
Is that an unregulated product, because of a loophole at the federal level, will now be removed from the shelves.
State Senator Teresa Ruiz sponsored the bill.
She says hemp generally contains Delta eight.
A milder cousin of the regulated marijuana now sold in New Jersey state licensed cannabis dispensaries.
It's supposed to contain just 0.3% or less of the psychoactive chemical THC.
So it's been unregulated, aided under federal law.
You don't have to keep it behind a closed door.
You don't have to ask for age demographics.
You can sell it golden liquor stores or in small mom and pop shops.
Not anymore.
Under Jersey's new law, which also permanently ban selling products with detectable levels of THC to anybody under age 21, Emergency medicine chair Dr. Lewis Nelson approves.
Very often we'll see people who come in because they've taken an amount that they didn't expect, usually too much, of course, and they will come in altered and then confronted by family or friends.
They could be especially little kids.
It could be unconscious.
But adults too.
Or if you take too much, it's quite disorienting.
Governor Murphy signed the measure despite deep concerns, noting because the bill would address this present danger of concluding the wiser course is to sign the bill now and commit to working with the legislature to address the technical issues and other challenges in separate legislation.
Indeed, a court challenge is imminent over whether the law impedes interstate commerce.
This is going to obviously put us at a competitive disadvantage to our other states that are still permitting this marketplace.
Beau Hutch represents the hemp beverage industry.
He says liquor stores that sell their lucrative THC infused drinks warn the new law threatens $100 million of New Jersey sales this year alone.
It is very obvious to everybody involved that litigation is highly, highly, highly probable.
And at this point, you know, it's going to be the type of lawsuit that is throwing everything in the kitchen sink at it.
And it doesn't matter where the product is being manufactured until New Jersey has a framework that that creates a safety way of selling this to a proper consumer.
There should be no types of these products available on any shelf.
Meanwhile, New Jersey based breweries fear the new Delta eight regulations could be so prohibitively expensive it could keep them out of the market.
They would have to meet a very high threshold security requirements or financial requirements.
I think as brewers, I mean, we're still looking to get into this industry.
One of the things that we saw far slower was to be able to make these beverages at our breweries.
We still have yet to get that right.
I appreciate a liquor store trying to diversify the product portfolio, but just like I'm not allowed to sell alcohol in my stores.
I would argue that there should be selling cannabis in their stores.
Scott Rutter claims it wouldn't be fair to regulated state dispensaries like his that have spent millions on their licenses.
The CRC has 180 days to compose new regulations.
Expect ongoing controversy.
I'm Brenda Flanagan, NJ.
Spotlight News.
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