The hemp industry has taken the DEA to court in the wake of a controversial new rule on marijuana extracts.<\/p>\n
Denver\u2019s Hoban Law Group, representing the Hemp Industries Association, Centuria Natural Foods and RMH Holdings LLC, on Friday filed a judicial review action against the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, alleging the agency overstepped its bounds when enacting a rule establishing coding for marijuana derivatives such as cannabidiol (CBD) oil. The action, Hoban attorneys allege, puts at risk a booming cannabis and hemp industry and a wide variety of hemp-based products currently on the market.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re talking about jobs and the economy and agricultural (revival),\u201d attorney Bob Hoban said in an interview with The Cannabist on Friday.<\/p>\n
The DEA last month confounded many in the cannabis industry with the filing of a final rule notice establishing a Controlled Substances Code Number for \u201cmarihuana extract,\u201d and subsequently maintaining marijuana, hemp and their derivatives as Schedule I substances.<\/p>\n
DEA officials said the code number would assist in the tracking of materials for research and would aid in complying with treaty provisions. However, compliance attorney Hoban and others expressed concern at the time that the language could result in federal agencies viewing products produced from marijuana and hemp as illegal.<\/p>\n
The rule was set to take effect Friday \u2014 the same day Hoban filed suit in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit in San Francisco.<\/p>\n
Hoban\u2019s petition seeks a judicial review of the final rule on the basis that the action was inconsistent with the law \u2014 including the U.S. Controlled Substances Act and the Agricultural Act of 2014, or the Farm Bill \u2014 and effectively amounts to a scheduling action.<\/p>\n
A scheduling action, Hoban said, would need congressional approval.<\/p>\n
According to the lawsuit:<\/p>\n
\u201cAdditionally, the final rule creates this new drug code, indicative of being a controlled substance, for substances which are in fact not controlled pursuant to the (Controlled Substances Act),\u201d Hoban attorneys wrote in the lawsuit. \u201cSpecifically, the final rule dictates that the mere presence of \u2018cannabinoids,\u2019 which are not controlled substances, is the determinative factor of whether a compound is a \u2018marihuana extract.\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cFurther, the final rule overbroadly defines \u2018marihuana extract,\u2019 without reflecting that certain portions and varieties of the genus Cannabis sativa L.<\/em> are congressionally exempted from the CSA and\/or are exempted from being treated as controlled substances altogether pursuant to the relevant laws, as enacted by Congress.\u201d<\/p>\n Hoban said Friday that his firm also intends to file an administrative petition next week with the DEA, formally requesting the administration to rescind the definition.<\/p>\n \u201c(The new rule) certainly has caused quite a chill in the marketplace over the last three or four weeks,\u201d Hoban said, adding that he\u2019s heard from producers who have had trouble keeping their products on e-commerce or retailer platforms. \u201cThe number of calls we get on a daily basis, you couldn\u2019t even quantify. \u2026 That is indicative to me of an environment where people are scared, they\u2019re nervous.\u201d<\/p>\n Hoban said he does not expect a spike in enforcement \u2014 especially as long as spending bill provisions stay in place \u2014 but he encouraged producers to maintain strict processes and to conduct an audit of their businesses to ensure that they are in compliance with state and federal regulations.<\/p>\n DEA spokesman Russ Baer said he could not comment on a petition that he has not yet seen.<\/p>\n Earlier Friday, Baer addressed the agency\u2019s positions on CBDs, marijuana and hemp extracts in an e-mail:<\/p>\n CBD oil and other extracts derived from cannabis (which includes hemp) have been and will continue to be Schedule I controlled substances, unless and until they are determined to have a current accepted medical use. We need conclusive scientific evidence to make these determinations and the lack of evidence regarding the efficacy of cannabis is impressive. To handle any controlled substance, an entity or individual must be a DEA registrant to be authorized to conduct research with the particular controlled substance.<\/p>\n Under U.S. law (the CSA), the definition of marijuana includes all parts the cannabis plant that are the source of cannabinoids. The CSA definition of marijuana also includes \u201cevery compound, manufacture, salt, derivative, mixture, or preparation\u201d of such parts of the cannabis plant \u2013 and CBD produced from the cannabis plant clearly falls within this category. Thus, CBD, being a derivative of marijuana, is marijuana under U.S. law (and hemp is marijuana). Accordingly, because marijuana is a schedule I controlled substance under the CSA (as set forth in 21 U.S.C. \u00a7 812(c), Schedule I(c)(10)), CBD is a schedule I controlled substance under the CSA.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n And as for hemp, specifically:<\/p>\n The Farm Bill did not remove industrial hemp from the list of controlled substances and, with certain limited exceptions, the requirements of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act and the CSA continue to apply to industrial hemp-related activities, nor did it change the requirements of the CSA that apply to the manufacture, distribution, and dispensing of drug products containing controlled substances.<\/p>\n DEA cannot provide an exhaustive list of \u201chemp\u201d products that are exempted from control. Nonetheless, in order to provide clarity to your question, the following are some of the more common \u201chemp\u201d products that are exempted (non-controlled), provided they are not used, or intended for use, for human consumption: paper, rope, and clothing made from fiber derived from cannabis stalks, industrial solvents made with oil from cannabis seeds, and bird seed containing sterilized cannabis seed mixed with seeds from other plants (or other ingredients not derived from the cannabis plant). Personal care products (such as lotions and shampoos) made with oil from cannabis seeds are also generally exempted.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Baer previously said that the new rule on extracts does not change the DEA\u2019s enforcement priorities.<\/p>\n John Hudak, deputy director of the Center for Effective Public Management and a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, said earlier this week that the extracts rule was not a change in policy but rather \u201ca clarification for an industry that for a long time has misinterpreted policy.\u201d<\/p>\n The biggest challenge is that marijuana laws have become a \u201ctelephone game\u201d in which rumors, guesses or ideas are translated from one person to another to the point where they\u2019re viewed as facts, he said.<\/p>\n As Baer stated Friday: \u201cDEA has consistently opined that marijuana and its constituent parts or derivatives, including CBD and hemp, are Schedule I controlled substances \u2013 so these determinations are deeply rooted in the CSA and not new.\u201d<\/p>\n And that was the case with extracts.<\/p>\n Products such as CBD oil were regarded as not subject to the same control requirements as marijuana and extracts could cross state lines and international waters without issue.<\/p>\n \u201cThe government was aware of this and issued (the final rule notice),\u201d Hudak said, adding that officials effectively conveyed, \u201c\u2018Listen, you have misinterpreted our laws regarding CBD and you have one month to become compliant.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The hemp industry has taken the DEA to court in the wake of a controversial new rule on marijuana extracts. Denver\u2019s Hoban Law Group, representing the Hemp Industries Association, Centuria Natural Foods and RMH Holdings LLC, on Friday filed a judicial review action against the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, alleging the agency overstepped its bounds […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1276","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n