One of the state’s most powerful lawmakers pulled a parliamentary maneuver Wednesday in a last-ditch effort to move medical marijuana legalization forward in North Carolina.
That House bill, which would boost physician assistant’s authority to practice without a doctor’s supervision, passed the House unanimously. It’s sponsored by key House leaders on health care issues.
The amendment sends a message that’s not uncommon in the waning days of a legislative session: Move on my priorities, or we won’t move on yours. Rabon, R-Brunswick, chairs the Senate Rules Committee, which decides which bills the state Senate votes on and when.
This legislative session is likely to wrap up in July, and House lawmakers had varying opinions Wednesday on whether Rabon’s medical marijuana bill, Senate Bill 3, is dead for the session. But it’s clearly struggling to find enough support among the House’s Republican majority to move forward.
“I wouldn’t say there’s no appetite [for the bill],” he said. “There’s not sufficient appetite.”
The measure may have enough votes to pass the House if it comes to the floor, allowing Republican and Democratic members to vote on it. But it doesn’t have support from at least half of the chamber’s Republicans, which is the threshold it must clear under an unwritten rule of procedure that the House Republican majority operates under.
This is common in politics and sometimes referred to as the Hastert Rule after former U.S. House Speaker Dennis Hastert.
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