Is whiplash a side effect of cannabis? It sure feels like it after taking stock of the chaotic situation unfolding in New York State. As we covered on these pages several weeks back, the state's heavy-handed approach towards regulating the newly opened legal cannabis market has inspired the wrath and frustration of beverage and edibles makers, who saw their ability to sell hemp-based THC-infused products abruptly halted in August following the filing of emergency regulations by the state. That sparked a legal response from cannabinoid seltzer brand Cycling Frog and trade group the Hemp Beverage Alliance, asking the courts for an injunction of the “ill-conceived emergency regulation.” But in a significant win yesterday, the New York Supreme Court ordered a preliminary injunction against the emergency measures, acknowledging that -- caught between balancing the equities of regulators and petitioners -- the latter party should be favored because an injunction "would stave off the shuttering of their businesses." In his ruling, Supreme Court Justice Thomas Marcelle didn't dispute the ultimate authority of New York's Cannabis Control Board and Office of Cannabis Management to regulate products that contain hemp-derived cannabinoids, but pointedly noted that, "at least until the current emergency regulations at issue here," those bodies had "decided not to directly regulate THC levels of hemp infused products" when they began showing up in New York around 2021. That changed ("for reasons unexplained," Justice Marcelle wrote) in July when the Board approved Emergency Cannabinoid Hemp Regulations under the guise of protecting the public, and young children, from products they deemed "ambiguous labeling that puts consumers at risk of overconsumption." That stance has been challenged in the suit, which contends that the 1 1/2 page Emergency Justification filed by the Board failed to support its position that an emergency existed and lacked specific examples of its purported assertions. Justice Marcelle was unmoved; in his decision, he called the petitioners’ arguments against the Emergency Justification "compelling," affirming the lack of factual support and quipping that the document's "parade of horribles that await children from petitioner's products lack specific recital of any actual facts upon which such concerns are based." The Board issued further evidence in response after the Emergency Justification, a move that Justice Marcelle appeared skeptical to even consider and to which its arguments had little effect. Instead, he sided with petitioners, agreeing that irreparable injury had occurred with regard to the loss of business and uncertain future, particularly those who had taken financial risks to enter the market early. To that point, Justice Marcelle's decision notably includes an admission by state regulators that intoxicating hemp products could undermine the adult-use cannabis market that they license and control, which petitioners have claimed was one of the motives behind the emergency move. So what now? It doesn’t change the fact that Cycling Frog and other hemp-infused product makers in New York will ultimately have to work under the oversight of state regulators, or that competition and conflict with the struggling adult-use market is a practical concern moving forward. But for the moment, in the words of one Cycling Frog VP on LinkedIn, “Hemp is back.” Read the full story on BevNET | 
