Gavin Newsom, the drug warrior – Daily News

Eight years have passed since Californians voted to legalize marijuana with Assembly Bill 64. And to no one's surprise, California managed to completely botch marijuana legalization and regulation.

Overregulation, high taxes and bureaucratic hurdles for people willing to obey the law have resulted in the black market being as robust as ever.

The state's failure to make it easier for legal operators to do business, coupled with a change in federal law in 2018 that legalized industrial hemp, sparked a booming market for hemp products.

Because California law regulates intoxicating hemp products separately from the legal marijuana market, many manufacturers who would otherwise have complied with the state's marijuana laws circumvent them by producing hemp-based intoxicating products instead.

However, another popular market for hemp products is products containing hemp-derived CBD to treat various ailments without intoxicating effects.

But instead of learning from past mistakes, Governor Gavin Newsom on Monday called for and received an emergency ban on consumable hemp products with detectable THC levels.

This effectively bans both intoxicating hemp products and non-intoxicating, therapeutic hemp products. Adults aged 21 and over are still allowed to buy hemp products, but these must not contain any THC.

People who use such products for therapeutic purposes will “continue to be able to obtain cannabis products containing THC through licensed recreational and medical cannabis dispensaries.” However, some have expressed concern that it will be difficult for them to find therapeutic products comparable to what they can currently obtain in hemp products at state-licensed dispensaries.

Newsom's hardline approach undermines choice and personal freedom. There is an obvious middle ground here: require intoxicating products to be sold only to adults (just like marijuana and alcohol) and regulate consumable cannabis products only lightly and with reasonable safety standards. But Newsom, as he often does, is going about things wrong.