Kentucky’s House majority whip is pushing back on the governor’s expansion of medical marijuana conditions, and said he wants those who follow it to be prosecuted.
On Tuesday, during an Interim Joint Committee on Judiciary meeting, Republican Rep. Jason Nemes, of Louisville, addressed Kentucky’s attorney general.
“I’m asking you, as our chief law enforcement officer, to do all that you can do to make sure that the law is followed and that those who break the law, even under the understanding that they might be following an unlawful executive order, are prosecuted and they lose their license,” Nemes said to AG Russell Coleman.
Specifically, he mentioned the Kentucky Board of Medical Licensure, the Kentucky Board of Nursing, and other regulatory agencies.
Last week, Gov. Andy Beshear (D) issued an executive order to add 15 new conditions to this list.
Some of the conditions Beshear added are terminal illnesses, ALS, AIDS and Huntington’s disease. | Read them all here.
Nemes said the General Assembly passed “a very tight bill” around marijuana, and declined the governor’s request last session to add those conditions.
“We will not become Oklahoma. We will not become Ohio. We want this for people who need it, who are in the conditions that we have established. Some of us want to expand conditions, some of us don’t. There is a lawful process to do that,” he said.
Beshear responded to Nemes’ comments Thursday in his weekly Team Kentucky update.
“This was the right thing to do. It’s helping a lot of people. And I was, really surprised to see an attack from one lawmaker who called on the attorney general to prosecute people dying of a terminal illness for securing medical cannabis. I mean, that’s a complete lack of humanity. It is really low. I mean, an individual with ALS, you want to prosecute, and that is certainly not leadership,” Beshear said.
However, Nemes only specifically mentioned prosecuting agencies who complied with the new order, not patients.
Beshear then essentially called him a bully.
“That’s my job, to stand in between those bullies and these individuals that have these very serious conditions that are saying, just give me something, that isn’t addictive, that isn’t opioids, and that can help me,” Beshear said.
WLKY has reached out to both Nemes and Coleman for further comment. This story may be updated.
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