Patrick Ramps Up Defense of THC Ban
Amid Mounting Fears of Governor Veto
Capitol Inside
May 28, 2025
Fearing a veto for a multitude of reasons, Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick and Texas Senate Republicans launched a frantic attempt to rescue a statewide THC prohibition that could be on the doorstep of death with an elaborate presentation and photo op at a press conference on Wednesday.
Speaking behind a table that was topped with a packs of gummies and other consumable cannabis products that are available for retail sales across the state, Patrick led a cast of speakers that included the Senate sponsor and several law enforcement officers and local officials who echoed horror stories that had been used to sell the ban in Senate Bill 3.
The Republican Senate president portrayed himself in a superhero light in defense of SB 3 - telling a packed room behind the chamber floor that the legislation was needed "to save an entire generation from being hooked on drugs."
Patrick claimed that the state's booming THC was simply of function of drug dealers exploiting a loophole in a hemp bill that he and the other Republicans at the briefing had supported in 2019. Patrick asserted that no one in their right mind would ingest the candy on the table in front of him - a claim that flies in the face of the fact that millions of Texans have been consuming THC products that are for sale at more than 10,000 small businesses that employ an estimated 53,000 people across the state.
The elaborate production for the media was a veiled bid to exert pressure on Governor Greg Abbott indirectly as he deliberates on whether he will sign SB 3, let it become law without his name on it or relegate the measure to the legislative graveyard as proposal that's loaded with the potential to backfire in a number of ways.
Abbott could use his red pen to bury the THC ban as a possible disaster for the Texas majority party as an amazing disconnect from the reality of the Republican Party and its voters in the modern world. Polls have shown that a rapidly-growing number of GOP voters favor the legalization of marijuana for recreational use by adults who are 21 or older. Two-thirds of Texas voters across the partisan spectrum support the ability to purchase THC products at the retail level like they've been able to do here legally for six years.
Abbott could deem the prohibition in SB 3 to be a small business-killing unemployment act that would mark the first time that a state has shut down a thriving industry that its lawmakers created. Claims on loopholes tend to be a default position that legislators take when they've failed to anticipate the consequences of their actions. Abbott could see such an argument as a weak excuse for shirking responsibility.
State Senator Charles Perry - a Lubbock Republican who served as lead author on the hemp bill and THC ban in SB 3 - suggested at the news conference that the legislation wouldn't affect farmers because it doesn't forbid them from growing hemp for other commercial purposes. Agricultural producers in Texas may see Perry's statement as an insult in light of the fact that SB 3 would destroy the most lucrative market for a crop that has been tantamount to a financial godsend for six years until now.
Abbott has another possible incentive to veto SB 3 if he wants to establish himself as the top political leader in the nation's second-largest state where Patrick would be for all practical purposes if the governor caps off the Senate boss' incredible power grab with his signature on the bill banning cannabis. Abbott could erase widespread perceptions that Patrick is running state government after he persuaded the ruling Republicans in the House to revive the ban that GOP Speaker Dustin Burrows and top leaders there had not supported until the panic that the lieutenant governor triggered on SB 3.
But the press conference today made it clear that Patrick and the Senate Republicans are scared that the demise of the THC ban could be nigh. They've put Abbott in an all but impossible position by failing again to anticipate the political and economic repercussions of their actions on SB 3 as much if not more than that they did with votes that spawned the industry they're trying to shutter now.
The longer Abbott goes without an announcement on the call he must make on the legislation, the worse the measure's prospects for survival would appear to be.
more to come ...
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