Texas, California Governors Collide Over Redistricting; Hemp Lies in the Crosshairs

Gov. Greg Abbott filed a proclamation at 10:21 a.m. Aug. 15 to call the Texas Legislature back into a second special session beginning at noon Aug. 15 to consider 19 agenda items, including regulating hemp products.

Despite Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick and Republican state lawmakers being fixated on banning consumable hemp products containing trace amounts of THC and other intoxicating cannabinoids, the governor is once again asking that they “establish commonsense THC regulations.”

These commonsense regulations would include making it a crime to provide hemp-derived products to those under 21 years old, restricting synthetically modified compounds like delta-8 THC, limiting product potency to either 0.3% THC or 3 milligrams of THC, and establishing enforcement mechanisms, “all without banning lawful hemp-derived products.”

Abbott made the same call for regulation in the first special session after he vetoed prohibition legislation in the regular session that Patrick, as the presiding officer in the Senate, championed.

Despite the Texas Constitution barring state lawmakers from taking up legislative subjects in a special session that deviate from a governor’s call, Patrick and Texas Senate Republicans filed and passed Senate Bill 5 to ban the manufacture and sale of products containing hemp-derived THC and other intoxicating cannabinoids. Sponsored by Sen. Charles Perry, R-Lubbock, S.B. 5 mirrored the same legislation that Abbott vetoed in the regular session.

Whether the move to ban hemp THC products in the special session is unconstitutional, possibly deviating from Abbott’s call to regulate the products, could be a matter of judicial review down the road.

However, the Texas House was unable to reach a quorum—meaning it didn’t have two-thirds of members present to conduct business—to vote on S.B. 5 in the first special session because 57 House Democrats packed their bags and left town to block the 150-member chamber from voting on a congressional redistricting plan devised by Abbott. The redistricting ploy could add five Republican seats to the U.S. House to protect the Republicans’ slim majority in Washington come the 2026 midterm election.

While the House Democrats’ quorum-busting walkout was primarily to protest redistricting, their absence in turn prevented any legislative business from crossing the finish line in the first 30-day special session, including the hemp ban, despite the Senate covering the entirety of the governor’s call from within their chamber.

In turn, Abbott threatened earlier this week that he’d “continue to call special session after special session until we get this Texas-first agenda passed,” should the House Democrats not return to legislative duty. He made good on that promise Aug. 15.

“Delinquent House Democrats ran away from their responsibility to pass crucial legislation to benefit the lives of Texans,” Abbott said in announcing his call for a second special session.

“Because of their dereliction of duty, Texas families and communities impacted by the catastrophic Fourth of July flooding have been delayed critical resources for relief and recovery,” he said. “Numerous other bills to cut property taxes, support human trafficking survivors, eliminate the STAAR test, establish commonsense THC regulations, and many others have all been brought to a halt because Democrats refuse to show up for work. We will not back down from this fight. That’s why I am calling them back today to finish the job. I will continue to use all necessary tools to ensure Texas delivers results for Texans.”

In addition to the special session call, Abbott ordered the Texas Department of Public Safety to arrest the “delinquent” House Democrats who “abandoned” their duty.

As it relates to the July 4 flooding in Central Texas that resulted in more than 130 fatalities, Texas House Democratic Caucus Chair Gene Wu has a different take. Wu led the walkout earlier this month to block the governor’s redistricting plan, calling it a political scheme and claiming Abbott submitted to President Donald Trump by incorporating a “racist gerrymander map” into Texas politics.

During an Aug. 3 press conference hosted by Illinois Democratic Gov. JB Pritzker in Chicago, Wu pointed out that Texas GOP lawmakers failed to make natural disaster preparation and flood relief a priority during the first two weeks of the first special session and instead focused on the redistricting plan.

“They don’t even have a bill filed to deal with what they promised the deal with,” Wu said of the absence of disaster preparedness legislation. “Instead, they have spent their entire time playing dirty political games that only help themselves.” 

Amid Abbott’s calls for arrests and continued special sessions, the Texas fiasco has further sparked a divide in the national political scene.

In particular, former President Barack Obama came out in support of the Texas House Democrats’ quorum-busting tactics on Aug. 14.

“We can’t let a systematic assault on democracy just happen and stand by,” he said in a video posted on social media. “This precious democracy that we’ve got is not a given; it’s not self-executing. It requires us to fight for it. It requires us to stand up for it.”

As a result of the mid-decade gerrymandering attempt in Texas, California Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom is now joining the fight to balance the scales.

Newsom accused Abbott in an Aug. 14 video on social media of rolling over to Trump’s demands for redistricting.

“Trump’s election rigging comes to an end now,” Newsom said. “California won’t stand by and watch Trump burn it all down—we are calling a special election to redraw our congressional maps and defend fair representation.”

The difference in California, Newsom said, is that he plans to pick up five congressional seats for Democrats in Washington through the “consent of the people” this November, versus ramming through legislation in a special session.

Newsom called it a “five-alarm fire” for Democracy.