Oklahoma House And Senate GOP Leaders Dismiss Governor's Push To Repeal Medical Marijuana At The Ballot – Marijuana Moment
Oklahoma House And Senate GOP Leaders Dismiss Governor’s Push To Repeal Medical Marijuana At The Ballot
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Oklahoma Republican leadership in both chambers are voicing skepticism over the governor’s suggestion that the state should put a measure on the ballot to roll back its medical marijuana program.
After Gov. Kevin Stitt (R) used part of his State of the State address this month to pitch the idea of shutting down the state’s medical cannabis law, both Senate President Pro Tem Lonnie Paxton (R) and House Speaker Kyle Hilbert (R) have largely dismissed the proposal.
Asked about the prospect of advancing a joint resolution in the legislature to put the issue back before voters, Hilbert said Oklahomans have already drawn a clear distinction: They support medical marijuana and “resoundingly” oppose adult-use legalization, based on past election results.
“I think that’s the distinction for us as the legislature to follow, as well—making sure that marijuana is truly for medicinal purposes,” the speaker said. “I think something that the House of Representatives has stood strongly on over the past eight years and will continue to stand strong for this year is differentiating truly medical marijuana versus recreational.”
Paxton, the Senate president, told Tulsa World that he’s spoken with the governor about the issue and “said the fortunate thing about the medical marijuana question was that it was passed statutorily, which means the legislature, if we wanted to abolish that state question, we could do it with legislative action.”
“We wouldn’t even need a state question,” he said. “That cat’s already out of the bag. There are already people in Oklahoma that have set up businesses that are actually trying to do the right thing, trying to do what the will of the people was.”
“I don’t think we need a state question, and going back to the original intent of the 2018 [State Question] 788 vote, it was the will of the people who said they wanted the medical marijuana program,” Paxton said, adding that he doesn’t think “there’s support in the legislature” to pass a resolution to put a measure on the ballot revisiting the issue.
While the senator initially seemed to express openness to the idea, he separately said this month that he’s given it more thought and determined it’d be “really hard to completely undo” legalization and unfair to licensed medical cannabis operators who “invested their life savings into this program” and are “trying to do this for the Oklahomans that need that product—not for recreational, but for actual medicinal purposes.”
“It’s hard to unring that bell,” he said. “What I’m going to suggest to the governor is that we don’t run a state question on that, but instead we continue to push the regulations [and] we continue to regulate the industry.”
“What we got was this cartel-infested rural Oklahoma that was really, really the center of illegal marijuana in the nation,” Paxton said. “We have taken a big bite out of that, and we’re going to continue to work on it.”
He added that he’d “give the attorney general’s office credit as well,” as they’ve worked “very hard on it and continue to drive the illegal element out of the state.”
Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond (R) was asked this month about the governor’s call to have voters revisit the state’s medical marijuana program, and he said he’d “love” to see the state’s medical marijuana program wiped out.
However, he cautioned that doing so would mean reimbursing the hundreds of licensees participating in the market because the state would be “taking” a revenue source away from them.
The governor’s push for a reevaluation of Oklahoma’s medical marijuana law has drawn mixed reactions from top lawmakers and officials.
Senate Minority Leader Julia Kirt (D), for example, said she’s “not into revisiting state questions,” and lawmakers should “trust the people, and we should actually implement them as well.”
“This legislature, before our time, could have made a decision to put guardrails in place before this state question passed,” the senator said. “Instead, they stuck their head in the sand and let that question pass and be mayhem.”
Chris Anoatubby, the lieutenant governor of the Chickasaw Nation in Oklahoma, aligned himself with Stitt’s position, stating that the medical marijuana program as currently implemented has “been a problem all over Oklahoma.”
He added that he’d “absolutely” support “reforming” the cannabis law.
During his speech earlier this month, the governor complained that the state has “more dispensaries than we do pharmacies,” adding that marijuana retailers “hide an industry that enables cartel activity, human trafficking, and foreign influence in our state.”
While regulators and law enforcement have “done incredible work to hold back the tide of illegal activity,” Stitt said, the industry is “plagued by foreign criminal interests and bad actors, making it nearly impossible to rein in.”
“We can’t put a band-aid on a broken bone,” he said. “Knowing what we know, it’s time to let Oklahomans bring safety and sanity back to their neighborhoods. Send the marijuana issue back to the vote of the people and shut it down.”
While the governor’s rhetoric signals he may be interested in seeing the medical cannabis industry shuttered altogether, it’s not clear what exactly he wants voters to decide on and his office has not released specific language of a proposed ballot measure.
Back in 2022, Stitt similarly used his State of the State address as an opportunity to dig at the voter-approved medical marijuana law, arguing that residents were misled by proponents of the ballot initiative.
Meanwhile, in November, Oklahoma activists withdrew an adult-use marijuana legalization initiative that they’d hoped to place on the state’s 2026 ballot.
After a short but aggressive signature push to secure ballot placement, Oklahomans for Responsible Cannabis Action (ORCA) ultimately did not turn in its petitions by the deadline, according to the secretary of state’s office.
ORCA said following the governor’s speech that the call for an end to the medical cannabis program is “simply an admission of his administration’s failure.”
“While we were busy advocating for common sense regulation, his appointees were busy importing thousands of illegal [Chinese Communist Party] grows,” the group said.”Fortunately, the Feds picked up prosecution.. because they weren’t getting held accountable by the State.”
“Fortunately, [Stitt] has no power here. It will take a vote of both the House and Senate to propose a vote to cancel SQ 788,” they said.”As we all move forward we must continue to be forward thinking, not backward acting. We look forward to talking and working with lawmakers, now and in the future.”
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Meanwhile, law enforcement leaders with the Oklahoma Association of Chiefs and Oklahoma Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs have been raising concerns about cannabis.
Also in Oklahoma, lawmakers last March advanced a bill aimed at protecting gun rights of state-registered medical marijuana patients, although federal law still bars cannabis users from owning firearms regardless of their patient status.
Another state bill filed last year by a GOP legislator would criminalize the use of medical cannabis during pregnancy.
Photo courtesy of Chris Wallis // Side Pocket Images.
Kyle Jaeger is Marijuana Moment’s Sacramento-based managing editor. He’s covered drug policy for more than a decade—specializing in state and federal marijuana and psychedelics issues at publications that also include High Times, VICE and attn. In 2022, Jaeger was named Benzinga’s Cannabis Policy Reporter of the Year.
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