September 29, 2023
Oklahoma U.S. Senator James Lankford blames Oklahoma’s passage of medical marijuana for a jump in foreign ownership of farmland in the state.
It’s what he indicated as he spoke at the start of a Senate hearing and campaigned for his Security and Oversight of International Landholdings (SOIL) Act.
His efforts are aimed at China and the nation’s dependence on the foreign country from farmland purchases to pharmaceuticals to critical minerals.
Lankford says the boom in foreign land acquisition can be dated back to 2018 when the medical marijuana bill was passed in the state.
Sen. Lankford made the statements during hearings by the Senate Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry committee and the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.
If the bill passes it would require the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) to review agricultural land acquisition deals from non-market economies and countries that pose a national security risk to the United States, as well as consult the Secretary of Agriculture on such deals.
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