🧾 Rhode Island tells hemp licensees to empty the shelves by December 11

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Rhode Island told every licensed hemp business in the state to have over-limit product out of its facilities before December 11th, then published how to destroy it and offered to send someone to watch. Pennsylvania's Attorney General charged twelve people in a statewide distribution and laundering case and described everything seized as high-potency THC. A committee that shares a treasurer with the president's super PAC started spending cannabis industry money on ads for eleven House Republicans, and the ads never mention cannabis. And California suspended a permit covering nearly a million square feet at a farm the state had never once inspected.

🧾 The date, the method, and the witness
🚨 Twelve charged, one product category
💵 The money comes back out
🚜 Fourteen months, no inspector

The Rhode Island Cannabis Control Commission issued Cannabis Office Bulletin 2026-7 on Thursday, giving every licensed hemp business in the state until December 11th to get product above 0.4 milligrams of total THC per container out of its facilities, after which it is noncompliant and carries administrative penalties including fines. The order reaches Industrial Hemp Program licensees, Hemp Handlers, Dual Licensees, and Hemp-Derived Consumable CBD Distributors and Retailers, and it reaches websites, because a product that cannot be offered for sale cannot be shown, displayed or advertised online. The sentence that will cost people money is the one barring over-limit product from moving to a licensed cannabis retailer through an External Transfer request, regardless of the testing standard or methodology previously used to evaluate it, which closes the exit most operators holding inventory were counting on. The FAQ then does the thing bulletins usually leave out and explains how to destroy it: render the product unusable, grind the plant material until it cannot be distinguished from other plant material, mix it until the result is at least fifty percent non-cannabis waste by volume, and deliver it to a licensed solid waste facility. A licensee who wants the agency to observe and record the destruction can write in and schedule one, and the licensee who takes that offer buys a state record of what left the building. Cultivation is untouched, and the USDA and Rhode Island planting, sampling and harvest requirements all still apply. Three separate times the bulletin says the federal requirement remains subject to delay or further guidance, so a change in Washington moves the date and leaves the rest of the order standing. (Rhode Island Cannabis Control Commission, Cannabis Office Bulletin 2026-7; 560-RICR-10-20-1; The Marijuana Herald)

🏜️ Utah's Medical Cannabis Policy Advisory Board voted 7 to 0 to recommend five changes loosening the state's advertising restrictions, with one member absent and one seat vacant. Pharmacies and production establishments could advertise educational and card events, processors could put URLs or QR codes on packaging pointing patients to product information and the point of purchase, pharmacies could sell branded or educational merchandise, and recommending providers could promote card events held at clinics and pharmacies. J.D. Lauritzen and Blake Smith wrote the memo behind it, leaning on a state market analysis in which 21 percent of people using cannabis medically without registering named lack of awareness, second only to cost. The vote changes nothing by itself, since every item needs the Legislature and some need rule amendments after that. The board meets again today. (The Marijuana Herald; Utah Medical Cannabis Policy Advisory Board)

🚜 California's Department of Cannabis Control suspended Joel Michaely Farms' cultivation permit on September 8th and recalled three batches of Natura Manufacturing's Iced Infused Flower the next day, product that reached retailers statewide after mid-August. The suspension notice, obtained by MJBizDaily through a records request, alleges untagged plants, unaccounted inventory, missing track-and-trace entries, pesticide and environmental violations, and adulterated cannabis. Officers serving a warrant four days after the August 27th death of Yufang Lan, 46, allegedly found 55,069 plants, roughly 6,000 pounds of processed cannabis, illegal chemicals and about 20,000 gallons of contaminated liquid. Her cause of death has not been established and no arrests have been reported. Department spokesperson Jordan Traverso says the grow was permitted in July 2025 and nobody from the agency had been on the property since. County records put the approved canopy near a million square feet. (MJBizDaily; California Department of Cannabis Control)

Attorney General Dave Sunday announced charges Monday against twelve people accused of moving cannabis and other high-potency THC products from warehouses into convenience stores across Pennsylvania. All twelve have been arraigned on counts including corrupt organizations and dealing in proceeds of unlawful activity, and many face felony trafficking charges as well. Investigators traced about $18.7 million in proceeds, run largely through LLC fronts taking cash deposits, and seized roughly 150,000 items from three distribution hubs in Plum Borough, Pittston and Bensalem, with search warrants also served at smoke shops and convenience stores around the Commonwealth. A statewide investigating grand jury recommended the charges last month, Senior Deputy Attorney General Rachel Wheeler will lead the prosecutions, and none of it has been proven against anyone. Sunday said many of the seized products were packaged and flavored to attract children. The release never separates hemp-derived product from cannabis anywhere in its description, and neither did the shelf it came off. Sen. Dan Laughlin's Cannabis Control Board bill, which would have taken the medical program out of the Department of Health and put one agency over intoxicating products, failed 27 to 23 in June after Democratic cosponsors voted against it. Last week the Auditor General asked the Department of Health for its medical cannabis inspection files and a third of them were missing. The office bringing this case is the one left holding statewide jurisdiction and a grand jury. (Pennsylvania Office of Attorney General; Local 21 News; The Philadelphia Inquirer)

🔑 Shrewsbury's Select Board approved the transfer of a retail cannabis license on August 25th, moving the VeriLife store to new ownership after its parent, Pharmacannis Massachusetts, went into bankruptcy and its assets and licenses went to auction. MiLou Shrewsbury LLC bought them, with Meredith Moghimi holding 100 percent, and the branding, management, staff and layout all stay. The instrument is the host community agreement, which bars transfer or assignment of the license without Select Board approval. A buyer who cleared the bankruptcy auction still had to clear Town Hall. (Community Advocate)

America First Agriculture Action Inc., which shares treasurer Charles Gantt with the president's MAGA Inc., is spending close to $1.8 million supporting eleven House Republicans in difficult November races. Trulieve, Curaleaf, Verano and Ascend Wellness all gave to that committee in June, along with entities tied to Green Thumb Industries and AYR Wellness, for $11.5 million in a single month and at least $15.05 million in cannabis-linked giving to Trump-aligned committees overall. The ads run for Reps. Tom Barrett, Nick Begich, Rob Bresnahan, Juan Ciscomani, Gabe Evans, Brian Fitzpatrick, Jen Kiggans, Mike Lawler, Scott Perry, Bryan Steil and Derrick Van Orden, and they talk about the insider trading ban and taxes on tips and overtime. Cannabis never comes up. Several of these members do have a record on it. Fitzpatrick, Perry and Steil voted against the legalization bills that reached the floor in 2020 and 2022 and against amendments shielding state programs from federal interference, though Fitzpatrick and Perry both voted for banking in 2019 and 2021. Kiggans voted against legalization in the Virginia Senate. Lawler said last year that rescheduling would be wrong. Puck News reported the spending first and read it as a reward for votes on the bill carrying the hemp delay. There was no standalone vote on that provision, and several of the companies paying for these ads want the hemp channel restricted rather than protected, so the reward reading does not survive either fact. Political giving establishes access rather than outcomes, and this is access purchased inside a House majority whose leadership says the opposite out loud while the decisions sit in the executive branch. The October 15th filing covers the period these buys were made in. (Marijuana Moment; Federal Election Commission committee C00906701; Puck News)

🥊 Curaleaf asked the Alberta Securities Commission on Monday for an expedited hearing to stop Aurora Cannabis from issuing shares under its at-the-market program while Curaleaf's US$4.00 per share offer stands, arguing the issuances harm Aurora shareholders and the integrity of Alberta's capital markets. Curaleaf notes that Aurora has lately described itself as debt-free with about C$149 million on hand, which sits oddly beside continued dilution. Miguel Martin answered that the program dates to February, that it funded Aurora's recent UK acquisitions, and that Curaleaf carries more than a billion dollars of debt including $500 million at 11.5 percent. Aurora's board rejected the offer unanimously weeks ago, and a Canadian securities regulator now gets to decide whether an issuer can keep selling stock into a live bid. (StratCann; Curaleaf and Aurora Cannabis releases)

📦 Infarmed defended Portugal's tightened cannabis oversight at last week's Portugal Medical Cannabis conference while reporting that export permits now clear in about twelve days, against the two to three month waits industry speakers described. Vasco Bettencourt, who runs the licensing unit, described new controls on traceability, waste and supplier qualification built after Operação Erva Daninha, the diversion and document falsification investigation that produced charges in May 2025 against 24 defendants, thirteen individuals and eleven companies, all of which remain allegations. The regulator reported 79,883 kilograms of cannabis exported in 2025 and more than 66,000 in the first half of this year, against 7,023 patient prescriptions for the whole of 2025. (Business of Cannabis)

🤝 Village Farms International named Deepak Anand to a new vice president of government affairs role on Monday, reporting to chief strategy officer Brian Stevenson and covering government relations, regulatory affairs and public policy in every market the company operates in. Anand built ASDA Consultancy Services and advised more than forty cannabis companies through it, worked at Cannabis Compliance Inc. and Zenabis, and served as an independent director of The Valens Company. The fit shows up in the numbers Village Farms reported in August, when export sales rose 74 percent while Canadian branded and US revenue both fell, because growth coming out of the Netherlands and Germany runs through four regulators at once. (Village Farms International; Markets Insider)

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