Abbott Calls for Banning Most THC Products
in Flip-Flop for Ages that Shows Patrick Boss
Capitol Inside
July 22, 2025
Governor Greg Abbott made a more extensive case for a veto than he ever had in the past when he killed a THC ban on the grounds that would criminalize farmers, parents, military veterans, pharmacists, small businesses and workers if it survived in the courts where it would be doomed to fail as a consequence of undeniable legal defects.
The veto was the boldest move of a long career for a politician who'd shied from taking risks and demonstrated a propensity to panic at times in the face of pressure and heat. It gave Abbott the prime opportunity to establish himself as the state's most powerful leader after a regular session in Austin where Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick was running the Senate and the House by the time it ended. Abbott used the veto of Senate Bill 3 to send a message to Patrick and GOP lawmakers he'd bullied and controlled that he's the boss at the Texas Capitol.
Then - exactly one month after putting the prohibition in SB 3 to death with the red pen - the Republican leader swallowed four pages of words in the veto proclamation when he announced on Tuesday that he backed a ban on hemp products with intoxicating levels of THC in one of the all-time flip-flops in modern Texas history.
Abbott press secretary Andrew Mahaleris outlined the new position on hemp said in a statement that was released after the governor reversed course in an interview with Community Impact - a publication that's delivered at no cost in the mail in the largest Texas cities.
"Hemp products should be banned for those under the age of 21, with a full ban on extraordinarily dangerous synthetic products," Mahaleris said. "Adults should be able to access heavily regulated, nonintoxicating levels of hemp, and there should be strict legal enforcement of hemp that exceeds 3.0 milligrams total THC per serving."
GOP State Senator Charles Perry of Lubbock brought the THC ban back to life on the first day of a new special session on Monday when he filed an expanded version in Senate Bill 5. Perry sponsored the bill that legalized hemp in Texas in 2019 in response to federal legislation that President Donald Trump signed into law during his first term.
Patrick unveiled his priorities for the special session on Tuesday with the THC prohibition as the third highest issue behind flood-related legislation and redistricting on a list with 15 Senate bills and their designated sponsors. Patrick was the first lieutenant governor to ever try to aggressively pressure a governor into a decision on the fate of legislation in Texas. The most powerful state Senate president in contemporary Texas became the first to single-handedly flip the House on a major vote when the Republicans abandoned the leadership's regulatory proposal and voted to ban THC in the face of Patrick threats.
The list of Patrick priorities has a lower tier that includes abortion, a repackaged bathroom bill, Staar tests, property tax relief, human trafficking victims, the attorney general's powers in election fraud cases, taxpayer-funded lobbying, water projects, police records disclosure, title theft and a state judicial expansion.
Patrick tapped Perry to take the lead on the Senate's response to the killer flood in the Hill County on July 4th as the sponsor of a natural disaster preparation and recovery plan in Senate Bill 1. A pair of Houston Republicans - State Senators Paul Bettencourt and Joan Huffman - were cast in the lead roles on emergency warning and relief funding proposals in Senate Bills 2 and 3 respectively.
Patrick picked GOP State Senator Mayes Middleton of Galveston to reprise his role as author of the local lobbyist hiring measure in Senate Bill 12 on top of his part as the chief sponsor for the bathroom bill that's camouflaged as a women's privacy plan for sex-segregated places in Senate Bill 7.
Bettencourt drew double duty as well with the emergency communications legislation and the special session's property tax relief that he's authored with Senate Bill 9.
more to come ...
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