Trump’s shutdown deal quietly recriminalizes most hemp-derived THC products next year, capping them at 0.4 milligrams of total THC per container and banning synthetics. From Texas to Minnesota, governors, brewers and farmers are already signaling they’ll regulate on their own terms instead of treating Washington’s new limit as the last word.
TL;DR:
Trump’s new law redefines legal hemp, caps products at 0.4 mg total THC per container, bans synthetic or chemically converted cannabinoids and takes full effect in November 2026 after a one-year transition.
Texas, Kentucky, Minnesota, North Carolina, Florida and others are testing the edges: keeping hemp THC legal under state law, building strict regulatory frameworks or openly organizing to change the federal rules.
Last week, High Times broke down how Congress ended the longest government shutdown in U.S. history and, in the process, scheduled the recriminalization of most hemp-derived products. The deal President Donald Trump signed caps legal hemp at 0.4 milligrams of total THC per container, bans synthetic or chemically converted cannabinoids and gives the industry one year before most hemp products (including drinks, gummies and vapes) are treated as Schedule I marijuana.
On paper, the ban is national and absolute. In reality, it’s already turning into a state-by-state fight over who actually controls cannabis policy.
Paper Law vs. Real-World Enforcement
Technically, cannabis has been federally illegal the whole time, yet a $32 billion marijuana industry operates in dozens of states. Now, a $28.3 billion hemp sector is being shoved into the same contradiction.
Law professor Jonathan Adler told MJBizDaily: “While marijuana is illegal for purposes of federal law, the federal government doesn’t have the resources, doesn’t have the personnel to go after individual retailers, individual buyers, let alone individual users.” If that is true for state-licensed cannabis, it is even more true for …
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Author: Javier Hasse / High Times
