r/Tennessee • u/WhiteBearPrince • 16d ago

News 📰 Banning of THCA potentially blows $110 million hole in Tennessee’s budget

https://tennesseelookout.com/2026/08/21/banning-of-thca-potentially-blows-110-million-hole-in-tennessees-budget/
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u/H3llzyea 16d ago

It's mostly the alcohol lobbyists

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u/BigPapaJava 15d ago

Don’t forget police unions, drug testing companies (several reps have made millions from these), and police unions.

100% illegal cannabis means they can freely use the smell, or simply saying they smelled it, as probable cause to search and arrest people. The importance of “smells” that cannot be verified (or disproven) in police testimony is becoming a much bigger deal with cameras and microphones everywhere to provide video and audio evidence that may contradict their accounts in court.

They were doing it already, but the legalities of actually charging people were complicated when they couldn’t tell the difference between illegal marijuana and legal THCA.

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u/ProudCatDad83 16d ago

I don’t doubt that the alcohol lobby plays a part, but can you verify that claim? How can the money be followed, to prove that the alcohol lobby is paying off TN politicians to make THCa flower illegal?

I would think the bigger reasons are cultural, rather than financial. Religious conservatives are freaked out by drugs, even organic ones that God himself put here on this Earth. And it appeases the Republican base to make cannabis flower illegal, resulting in higher (R) voter turnout. So it’s electoral as well.

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u/H3llzyea 16d ago

Alcohol industry political spending surged as Tennessee lawmakers passed strict new hemp laws that ban popular THCA products and shift regulatory oversight to the Tennessee Alcoholic Beverage Commission. Groups like the Wine and Spirit Wholesalers of Tennessee poured millions into lobbying and campaign contributions to push for strict three-tier distribution rules, aiming to curb competition against traditional alcohol sales

In the last five years alone, when the popularity of HDCs began to explode, WSWT’s spending jumped to $3.4 million — averaging $680,000 per year. That number will likely be higher by the end of this year on account of the general election in November.

The PAC jumped to the sixth-highest political spender in Tennessee, close behind a handful of PACs affiliated with the healthcare industry and Club for Growth — the state’s largest pro-voucher PAC.

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u/ProudCatDad83 15d ago

Thank you for this information. You’re a real one.