I heard from someone that in the state of California, private individuals are allowed to sell their surplus weed crops, even across state borders. Is that true and are other States who have similar regulations.
That would be a violation of federal law, but it does happen all the time.
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I canât remember the exact details but I think California passed a law allowing licensed producers to sell their crops to other states that joined in a compact, but it was more theoretical than actual, as @JustANobody said, itâs still federally illegal (to transport across state lines, let alone sell it). Also⌠itâs unlikely a state would meaningfully sanction sales by private parties as it likely runs afoul of the Cole Memo.
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Itâs going to be interesting to watch from afar:
The new law:
â A. Budget Request Summary
The Department of Cannabis Control (Department) is requesting $264,000 Cannabis Control
Fund in 2023-24 and $256,000 ongoing for 1.0 position to fulfil the workload associated with
Chapter 396, Statutes of 2022 (SB 1326). This will allow the Department to create an interstate
cannabis commerce regulatory framework and assist with the development of interstate
agreements, as necessary.
B. Background/History
Chapter 70, Statutes of 2021 (AB 141) established the Department of Cannabis Control on July
12, 2021, by consolidating the three state cannabis licensing authorities (the Department of
Consumer Affairâs Bureau of Cannabis Control, the California Department of Food and
Agricultureâs CalCannabis Cultivation Licensing Division, and the California Department of
Public Healthâs Manufactured Cannabis Safety Branch) into a single, new state department.
The Department is responsible for regulating all aspects of the commercial cannabis industry,
and has the authority to create, issue, deny, renew, discipline, condition, suspend, and revoke
licenses for cannabis cultivators, manufacturers, distributors, retailers, microbusinesses, testing
laboratories, and temporary cannabis events. Cannabis activity conducted without a license
is illegal, subject to fines and penalties at both the state and local levels.
SB 1326 authorizes the Governor to enter into an agreement with one or more other states
authorizing interstate commercial cannabis activity (either medicinal, or adult-use, or both). SB
1326 creates a limited exception to Californiaâs existing state-law prohibition against exporting
cannabis to other states. The bill requires that such agreements mirror existing California law
regarding certain issues, such as health and safety standards, track-and trace participation,
and packaging and labeling standards. Out-of-state licensees conducting business in
California would still be required to obtain a California license and, if applicable, local
authorization. The intent of this bill is to strengthen Californiaâs legal cannabis market by
allowing the legal market to begin to access interstate markets.
Because California law prior to the enactment of SB 1326 did not allow interstate cannabis
commerce under any circumstances, the Department does not currently regulate interstate
commerce except to the extent that illicit interstate commerce may be subject to
enforcement action by the Department. States that have now legalized interstate commerce
have this universal, state-level prohibition against interstate cannabis commerce that has
created a fragmentated patchwork of legal commercial cannabis across the country: every
legal state has its own closed-loop legal cannabis market in which all legal in-state demand
seeks to match legal in-state supply (vice versa). Significant time and effort will be required to
expand Californiaâs existing cannabis-regulation framework to cover interstate cannabis
commerce. Incorporating interstate commerce into the California Cannabis Track-and-Trace
System may prove especially challenging. Other challenges would include the need to
confirm uniform and consistent testing standards; other public health and safety standards;
and provisions for product recalls, site inspections, and other potential enforcement and
consumer-protection efforts that might require coordination across state lines.
The Department will need to undertake further rulemaking to clarify the relationship between
Californiaâs existing cannabis-regulation framework and potential interstate cannabis
commerce. The Department may also need to impose new or increased fees on licensees to
recover increased compliance and enforcement costs stemming from increased volume and
complexity of work relating to interstate cannabis commerce.â
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Holy shit that hurt my brain cell
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So long story short. Nothing is finalized so it is illegal.
Will it be legal someday?
Unlikely, as interstate agreements are requires BOTH states to sign. Unfortunately, the importing state would be putting its own cannabis producers at risk in this process.
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I didnât do so bad because I have three.
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It could be that this is all above-board and theyâre just laying groundwork for federal legalization, and nothing will come of it until then⌠or it could be indeed be slightly more interesting.
The slightly conspiracy-theory take on this is that theyâre setting up an interstate commercial framework precisely because itâs illegal federally. If thatâs the case, theyâre more likely to move forward with it and have the participants limited to those who are willing to be the guinea pigs for a lawsuit against the US government. In order to have standing for such a lawsuit, they have to be able to claim before a court that theyâre actively being harmed by the restrictions against interstate commerce involving cannabis, otherwise it would just be thrown out of court. Participation in such a program, if the government stepped in and interfered, would allow such a lawsuit to proceed. That would indeed be interesting, and seems like it might have a shot in the Supreme Court. Textualists often donât vote along party lines, and this has an element of statesâ rights in it as well as being about cannabisâŚ
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I can see them winning with that argument. Because right now, the federal government IS standing in the way of interstate commerce.
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Classic answer: It depends.
I presume if the federal government does some day legalize cannabis possession and sales it will explicitly leave it up to individual states whether or not to legalize themselves.
If the federal government legalized possession and sales, individual states that have a legal cannabis market could not bar cannabis from being imported from out of state, because it would violate the interstate commerce clause. There wouldnât be any need for a compact.
In Californiaâs case I canât remember the details of whether they actually made an agreement with Oregon and Washington or just presumed they might make an agreement.
I suspect they were hopeful they could push boundaries a bit and maybe expand whatâs permissible under the Cole Memo⌠I thought the latest news was that they were walking back the whole thing because they were afraid the DOJ would actually take legal action against them?
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interstate hemp sales are legal. so, itâs doable.
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Could be that they werenât planning to take it any further and theyâre backing off - I havenât read that personally, but itâs certainly the simple and easy way to go. Itâs certainly not entirely without precedent for states to change their laws precisely so they can challenge federal laws in court, though. 
It kinda seems like thatâs becoming more of a standard for lawmaking, in fact, since Congress canât agree on anything except that they need more donations for re-election. Just shunt it off to the courts to decide. Of course, that just makes every election more and more about court-packing and delegitimizes Congress more and more, but thatâs a problem for the future⌠and the future is certainly not something we should expect our elected representatives to focus on. 
Their job is stirring up culture wars and fundraising, obviously!
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Lifted from the Current Events threadâŚ
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The west coast is so used to supplying the east coast for decades. When demand went down or new suppliers (Oklahoma) stepped in a massive surplus has been created.
In ny they put a law in place for hard cider. It has to be produced in ny to sell in ny. I imagine a similar law for weed
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Are you sure about that? I looked at Woodchuckâs website and they show multiple locations selling Woodchuck hard cider in NYC?
Given that alcohol laws have been a patchwork since prohibition I wouldnât be entirely surprised if the federal government gave states the right to make laws about importation of alcohol products from outside the state⌠but in the absence of that, clear violation of the ICC.
ETA: I see that the NYS regs that pertain to a âFarm Cideryâ say they can only sell hard cider made in NYS (and from NYS apples, unless a natural disaster bars doing so)⌠but that seems to only pertain to Farm Cidery businesses, not hard cider sales in general.
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Iâm not a 100 percent on the exact law. I do know angry orchard hard can cider bought an orchard in Orange County to be in the market
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Looks like youâre right, I hadnât read the fine print. I did notice the AGâs statement, but normally that wouldnât be enough to kill a law on its own. They specify right in the law that it wonât take effect unless one of the following applies:
However, an agreement with a partnering state will be sanctioned only if one of the following criteria are met:
- Federal legalization, which is not imminent.
- Federal law is enacted prohibiting the expenditure of federal funds preventing interstate cannabis transfer.
- The U. S. Department of Justice issues an opinion or memorandum allowing interstate transfer of cannabis.
- The U.S. attorney general issues a written opinion that state law pursuant to medical or adult-use commercial marijuana activity will not result in âsignificant legal risk to the State of California under the federal Controlled Substances Act, based on review of applicable law, including federal judicial decisions and administrative actions.â
So yeah, both prepping for legalization and exploring the possibility of doing it now under the current framework, but theyâre explicitly trying not to get sued.
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I know one issue talked about in these parts are testing inconsistencies too. If you move things over, itâll need clean tests from where itâs coming from and where itâs headed. If one states gives something up and it fails in the state it was sent to, it creates the dilemma of who should sell that weed? The state who wanted it or the state who sold it with good coaâs?
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There must be some advantage to having a Farm Cidery license?
I looked around and found an artisanal MA cider maker who ships to NY. Seems like a lot of the artisanal cider business is hyper-local, because many only supply a small number of retailers (not surprising, a lot of the beer industry is like that⌠just look at Heady Topper or Hill Farmstead).
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The states arenât selling anything⌠if a producer/supplier from one state tries to sell cannabis in another state⌠the purchaser is presumably going to require it pass local testing requirements or they wonât buy it, and then itâs the producer/supplierâs problem what happens with it. Iâm presuming that there wonât be direct sales, dispensaries will be involved selling to the end user.
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