Walz weighs in on canceled Minnesota cannabis license lottery: Litigation ‘happens in every state’

This article originally appeared in Nuggets, the Minnesota Star Tribune’s free, weekly newsletter about legal cannabis in Minnesota. Sign up at startribune.com/nuggets.

Gov. Tim Walz weighed in Thursday on the Office of Cannabis Management’s decision to cancel an early cannabis license preapproval lottery after a judge blocked it last month. The ruling came in response to lawsuits filed by applicants who said they were unfairly denied entrance to the lottery. In an interview with the Minnesota Star Tribune, Walz said he wasn’t surprised that litigation tied up the licensing process, saying, “I talked to other governors — this happens in every state.”

But he said he is disappointed that Minnesota won’t preapprove some social equity applicants for cannabis business licenses.

”I think there’s some equity pieces in there that’s important,” Walz said. “But the courts are the courts. And I just told [OCM], ‘We’re not going to get hung up on that. Just move forward.’”

A key goal of the canceled license preapproval lottery was to allow a select number of cultivators to immediately begin growing, helping build the state’s supply chain before the market launches. Now, cultivators won’t be able to begin growing until the market starts to roll out next year. At this point, the governor said he doesn’t think there’s much else the state can do to build supply ahead of time.

“The market, the supply and demand, will catch up. When they first launch, will there be shops that aren’t able to fill them? Probably,” Walz said. “Look, by the end of ‘27 or so, the ‘28 season, they’ll make up for it.”