AUSTIN, Texas – ​
Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick wants to see an end to THC sales in the Lone Star State, claiming businesses are abusing a state law that allows hemp products.

This new push to end the commercialization of THC comes from a senator in Lubbock, who’s planning to file Senate Bill 3 for the 89th legislative session.

For Austin retailers, like Tribe CBD and Cannabinoids, a possible ban on THC is unwelcome news.

“For our business, that would be really tough for a THC ban,” said Dominick Canchola, the store manager of Tribe CBD and Cannabinoids. “A lot of people rely on THC as medicine.”

In 2019, lawmakers allowed for the commercialization of hemp, which includes products with THC under 0.3 percent. THC is the main psychoactive component of cannabis.

However, in the five years since, Patrick says THC has gotten out of hand.

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“These stores not only sold to adults, but they targeted Texas children and exposed them to dangerous levels of THC,” said Patrick. “Since 2023, thousands of stores selling hazardous THC products have popped up in communities across the state, and many sell products, including beverages, that have three to four times the THC content which might be found in marijuana purchased from a drug dealer.”

“At Tribe CBD we are definitely not doing any of that,” said Canchola. “We are very very thorough about what we do.”

An Austin criminal defense law firm, Michael and Associates, tested the Lt. Governor’s theory about high THC levels. They picked ten legal dispensaries across the state and then tested its Delta 9 THC and CBD edibles. All the gummies were under the 0.3 percent maximum but weighed at least four grams, the legal weight limit.

“Let’s say it’s a chocolate bar the size of a Hershey’s bar,” said criminal defense attorney Ben Michael. “While the weight of that chocolate bar can be many ounces, if you look at the actual percentage of THC within that number of ounces, it falls below 3 percent.”

Even if that chocolate bar has multiple servings, it still weighs more than four grams, so Michael said police can still make an arrest. He sees clients with the legal amount of THC arrested because their product weighs more than four grams, but at the time of the arrest, officers can’t prove it’s under 0.3 percent, so they err on the side of caution.

“Because it’s by weight, all you have to do is eat enough of it, and you can still get high,” said Michael.

His law firm also found a new type of THC that’s 25 times more potent, but he says it’s technically legal because it’s not the THC banned under the 2019 law.

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“So if you can tweak the chemical compound a little bit in a lab so that it does not equal Delta 9, it equals something new, then the bill doesn’t make it illegal,” said Michael.

The study also found that “10 percent of samples were close to the potency levels marked on the package or indicated by lab testing outcomes provided by the manufacturers. Some were significantly more potent than advertised, while others contained significantly less Delta-9 than promised.”

The bill would ban all forms of THC, ridding the state of these problems not outlined in the 2019 law, but retailers hope they’ll consider a different route.

“An overall hemp ban of THC specifically would be a really bad idea for our industry as a whole and just for the people in Texas,” said Canchola. “I believe that what we need to do is go towards regulation rather than banning all together, and we haven’t really put many efforts towards regulation at all, and I think that’s the first step that needs to happen before we just say that there shouldn’t be any at all.”

If the bill becomes law, the only exception to it would be the state’s Compassionate Use Program, which allows prescriptions of low-level THC.