The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) are urging a federal court to dismiss a lawsuit from licensed New Mexico marijuana businesses who claim the agencies have been unconstitutionally seizing state-regulated marijuana products and detaining industry workers at interior checkpoints.
The federal agencies’ core argument is that, as long as marijuana remains federally prohibited, border agents are within their statutory right to disregard state law and seize the property—and that the limited protections that states with marijuana program enjoy under a congressional rider and general Justice Department discretionary policies don’t apply to CBP, which falls under DHS.
Representatives of eight New Mexico marijuana businesses jointly filed the lawsuit against the federal government last October in the U.S. District Court for the District of New Mexico. That action came months after initial reports emerged of CBP agents increasingly taking cannabis products and other assets from state licensees at border checkpoints throughout the state.
The plaintiffs are arguing that the CBP actions, without due process, violate protections against unlawful searches and seizures guaranteed under the Fifth Amendment. But CBP is contesting the challenge and moving for dismissal over a “failure to state a claim upon which relief can
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