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Cannabis and gambling interests had a bit of a roller-coaster week in Jefferson City, with big legislative wins in the Missouri House paired with reminders that neither business is operating in anything close to calm water.
Start with a bill aimed at banning intoxicating hemp products: the seltzers and gummies sold at gas stations and smoke shops, often with little clarity about potency, testing or labeling.
The House passed legislation that would effectively push intoxicating hemp products out of the unregulated retail world and restrict sales to licensed marijuana dispensaries. That’s only if lawmakers can pass some strict regulations — otherwise the products are essentially banned.
Supporters cast it as public safety: consumers shouldn’t be buying psychoactive products off a shelf next to beef jerky and energy drinks. But it also happens to kneecap a fast-growing competitor to the regulated marijuana industry, and nobody should pretend that part is incidental.
The cannabis industry has been pushing hard with both lobbyists and campaign cash. Over the last year, cannabis interests have donated roughly $700,000, much of it to PACs supporting various elected Republicans with sway like Gov. Mike Kehoe, Attorney General Catherine Hanaway, House Speaker Jon Patterson and Senate Appropriations Chairman Rusty Black.
In just the past three weeks, nine cannabis companies chipped in $225,000 to Missourians for Fair Regulations, a PAC run by a former St. Louis police officer.
Getting the hemp bill out of the House is a real win for the cannabis industry. But it landed the same week as a scathing audit of Missouri’s marijuana regulator that dredged up the program’s oldest controversy: whether the licensing process was as blind and impartial as advertised, or instead was built in a way that favored insiders.
Then there’s Missouri’s gray-market slot machines.
The House very narrowly approved legislation creating a state-run video lottery system — an attempt to replace and regulate the slot machines that have spread through gas stations, bars and fraternal halls across the state.
Two companies in particular have been everywhere this session: Illinois-based J&J Ventures, eager to expand if the machines become legal, and Wildwood-based Torch Electronics, the most visible operator in Missouri’s existing gray market. Together, they deployed roughly 30 lobbyists to move the bill across the finish line.
They’ve also backed the effort with campaign money. J&J gave about $1.2 million last year. Torch dropped around $650,000, plus another $135,000 from Warrenton Oil, whose convenience stores host many Torch machines.
Missouri’s casinos see video lottery as competition. They’ve pumped roughly $500,000 into a PAC since November and brought an army of lobbyists of their own to fight the bill.
Still, the legislation had key allies — including strong support from the House speaker — and it squeaked through by one vote.
And that’s where the good news ends for gray-market slot machines.
The attorney general’s office has made clear it wants the machines gone — warning gas station owners to evict them before they get dragged into court. Local prosecutors are also pushing removal efforts county by county. Meanwhile, the industry is dogged by the kind of federal attention that tends to make even the most confident lobbyists look over their shoulders.
Cannabis and gambling interests had a very good week in the Missouri House. But both wins come with asterisks — audits, investigations, legal pressure — and both face steep odds in the Senate, where opponents don’t look ready to throw in the towel.
Jefferson City, in other words, did what it always does: it gave both industries a victory lap, along with a reminder that the real fight is still ahead.
Jason Hancock has spent two decades covering politics and policy for news organizations across the Midwest, with most of that time focused on the Missouri statehouse as a reporter for The Kansas City Star.
