Industrial Hemp in Kentucky

Floor Speech

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Mr. COMER. Mr. Speaker, I rise to address an issue very near and dear to my heart--industrial hemp.

As Kentucky's Commissioner of Agriculture, I led the charge to make Kentucky the very first State to legally grow hemp. Fast forward to today, hemp is a major crop for our Kentucky farmers, and nearly every farmer I know who grew hemp last year was a former tobacco farmer.

Hemp is doing exactly today what I predicted in 2015. It has become an alternative crop to tobacco for Kentucky farmers.

The Senate recently added language to a continuing resolution that would put our Kentucky hemp farmers out of business. I will be working to add language to the continuing resolution next week to fix it. I certainly hope all my colleagues will join with me in supporting this language to help our Kentucky farmers as well as the hundreds of jobs that have been created because of industrial hemp in Kentucky.

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