Overview
- The 15th Court of Appeals granted the hemp industry’s emergency request to reinstate a temporary injunction, allowing smokable hemp back on shelves until an appeal is heard next week.
- The state’s appeal earlier this week had revived Department of State Health Services rules that count THCA toward a 0.3% THC cap and that effectively remove smokable products from retail sales.
- DSHS’s March 31 rules also require child-resistant packaging and product testing, and they raise some annual licenses for retailers from about $250 to as much as $10,000.
- Industry groups say renewed enforcement forces stores to pull flower and pre-rolls, scrap inventory, cut staff, and absorb fees they call an unconstitutional occupation tax.
- State attorneys defend the stricter standard as a safety measure because THCA converts to intoxicating delta-9 THC when heated, and a separate Texas Supreme Court ruling upholding a delta-8 ban affirms broad agency authority that could influence this fight.