Youngkin vetoes cannabis, minimum wage legislation

Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin vetoed legislation Thursday that would have put Virginia on the path to a $15 per hour minimum wage and set up a retail cannabis market, killing bills that were important to Democratic state legislators he blamed for torpedoing the $2 billion Alexandria sports arena deal he’d championed.

Amid a deepening partisan divide in Richmond, Republican Youngkin announced six more vetoes Thursday evening, targeting legislation supported by Democratic lawmakers that would have set a $15 per hour minimum wage in Virginia beginning in 2026, as well as a measure that would have established a retail market structure for recreational marijuana sales beginning next year.

The vetoes were hardly a surprise to political observers across the state, as Youngkin had previously signaled his lack of support for a legal cannabis retail market, although legislators from both parties said before this year’s General Assembly session that they have problems with the status quo, in which it’s legal to possess small amounts of marijuana and purchase cannabis products with a doctor’s prescription in licensed dispensaries — and yet the billion-dollar recreational cannabis retail black market remains unregulated and untaxed.

HB 1 and its Virginia State Senate counterpart, SB 1, would have increased the state’s mandatory minimum wage from $12 an hour to $13.50 starting Jan. 1, 2025, and set a $15 per hour minimum wage at the start of 2026. The legislation passed through the General Assembly along party lines this session — with 51 Democrats voting yes, and 49 Republicans voting no in the House of Delegates, and 21-18 in the Senate, with Republican Sen. Mark Peake abstaining.

Youngkin wrote in his veto statement that raising the state’s minimum wage to $15 an hour in less than two years “would implement drastic wage mandates, raise costs on families and small businesses, jeopardize jobs and fail to recognize regional economic differences across Virginia.” He had previously said there was no need for the state to raise the mandatory minimum wage, and that the free market was taking care of the issue.

The Virginia Chamber of Commerce applauded the minimum wage veto, saying in a statement Thursday, “Although Virginia’s economy has recovered strongly from the pandemic, surpassing pre-pandemic employment levels, not all regions of the commonwealth have experienced equal economic growth. Raising the hourly minimum wage to $15 would have led to shuttered businesses and lost jobs, particularly in the areas most in need of strong economic growth and particularly for Virginia’s small businesses.”

However, Sen. Ghazala Hashmi, D-Chesterfield, tweeted Thursday evening that “every working American deserves a living wage. Period,” in reference to the minimum wage veto, and Richmond Mayor Levar Stoney, a Democrat who is running for his party’s nomination for governor, wrote that he has proposed raising city employees’ minimum wage to $20 an hour, adding, “It’s high time our governor stops playing political games and focuses on what our families need to rise to the middle class.”

Cannabis retail legislation

Cannabis bills HB 698 and SB 448 passed mostly along party lines too, although Republicans Del. Chris Obenshain and Sen. Christie New Craig joined Democrats in voting yes. If enacted, the measures would have established a framework to allow legal retail sales of recreational marijuana in Virginia starting May 1, 2025, and issued state licenses to sell marijuana on Sept. 1, 2024.

“The proposed legalization of retail marijuana in the commonwealth endangers Virginians’ health and safety,” Youngkin wrote in his veto statement on the cannabis legislation. “States following this path have seen adverse effects on children’s and adolescents’ health and safety, increased gang activity and violent crime, significant deterioration in mental health, decreased road safety, and significant costs associated with retail marijuana that far exceed tax revenue. It also does not eliminate the illegal black market sale of cannabis, nor guarantee product safety. Addressing the inconsistencies in enforcement and regulation in Virginia’s current laws does not justify expanding access to cannabis, following the failed paths of other states and endangering Virginians’ health and safety.”

The twin bills’ chief sponsors — Sen. Aaron Rouse, D-Virginia Beach, and Del. Paul Krizek, D-Fairfax — blasted the governor’s veto in statements Thursday. “Gov. Youngkin’s dismissive stance towards addressing Virginia’s cannabis sales dilemma is unacceptable. Public servants are obligated to tackle pressing issues, regardless of their origin or culpability. They cannot cherry-pick which problems to address,” Rouse said, while Krizek said the governor’s “failure to act allows an already thriving cannabis market to persist, fueling criminal activity and endangering our communities.”

Thursday’s vetoes came after the legislative scuttling of a $2 billion deal to bring a proposed sports arena in Alexandria, a controversial deal touted by Youngkin as potentially producing 30,000 jobs for the state and billions in economic activity, while critics in the Virginia State Senate — led by Democratic Sen. Louise Lucas, who chairs the powerful Senate Finance & Appropriations Committee — balked at the idea of the state taking on approximately $1.3 billion in debt and establishing a state authority to manage the properties.

Although the deal was still considered alive — at least on paper — until the state’s 2024-26 budget is finalized in April, the Washington Wizards and Capitals’ majority owner, Monumental Sports & Entertainment CEO Ted Leonsis, and Washington, D.C., Mayor Muriel Bowser signed an agreement Thursday that will keep the NBA and NHL teams in the District of Columbia through 2050, putting an end to all negotiations between Monumental, the state and the City of Alexandria.

The arena proposal, while not directly tied to cannabis and minimum wage legislation, became a partisan battleground as Youngkin indicated that he wouldn’t compromise with Democrats on either priority, despite needing their votes to establish the state authority to own the arena and entertainment district. Meanwhile, Lucas blocked Senate Finance Committee votes on legislation that would have created the authority, and the state legislature’s 2024-26 budget amendments dropped all mention of the authority.

In a news conference after the General Assembly’s regular session closed in March without a Senate vote on the arena authority, Youngkin said he didn’t “have any interest in the cannabis legislation. … Bluntly, you want to talk about putting a cannabis shop on every corner. I don’t quite get it.”