As was extensively anticipated, Virginia’s Republican governor vetoed a invoice that might have lastly legalized adult-use marijuana gross sales within the state.
“The proposed legalization of retail marijuana within the Commonwealth endangers Virginians’ well being and security,” Gov. Glenn Youngkin stated in an announcement saying his Thursday veto, including that different states which have legalized leisure hashish gross sales are following a “failed path.”
“States following this path have seen antagonistic results on kids’s and adolescent’s well being and security, elevated gang exercise and violent crime, important deterioration in psychological well being, decreased highway security, and important prices related to retail marijuana that far exceed tax income.
“Trying to rectify the error of decriminalizing marijuana by establishing a secure and controlled market is an unachievable objective.”
Virginia legalized adult-use hashish in 2021 with a invoice signed into legislation by then-Gov. Ralph Northam, a Democrat.
Nonetheless, that legislation required state legislators to reenact parts organising regulated gross sales.
Within the years since, a partisan logjam led by Youngkin has stored adult-use legalization bottled up, encouraging the emergence of a bootleg market that some estimate is price $3 billion.
Medical marijuana gross sales are authorized within the state, albeit underneath comparatively tight restrictions that restrict enterprise alternatives to 1 operator per area.
These licenses are held by marijuana multistate operators.
This 12 months, the Democratic-controlled state Legislature handed a invoice legalizing leisure gross sales by 2025, albeit and not using a veto-proof majority.
Youngkin was clear he wasn’t a fan of leisure marijuana.
And after Democrats blocked a Youngkin pet venture – a publicly funded sports activities area – the governor signaled the adult-use marijuana invoice was doomed.