When the State Certificate Is Suspended, the Federal Registration Is Suspended Too.

#7…

The Consequences Page

The last page mapped the interfaces. This page names the one interface that already contains an automatic legal mechanism. There is no need to invent a DEA-versus-Health confrontation. A South Dakota administrative action can have an expressly specified consequence for a federal subsection (k) registration.¹

If the state medical-marijuana license is suspended, revoked, or expires, the federal registration “is automatically suspended.”² That sentence is in the April 28, 2026 text. It is not in the 38-section 44:90 package now in hearing.³ This page follows that sentence through the shop.

The chain starts with the state paper

The April order did not invent a free-standing federal shop license. It created an expedited registration pathway for entities holding a “State medical marijuana license.”⁴ That federal noun means a license issued by a state entity authorizing manufacture, distribution, and/or dispensing.⁵ South Dakota issues registration certificates in four types.⁶ Whether each certificate is the federal license remains unpublished at the state level. The gap is the story. The mechanism still runs on whatever paper DEA treats as the state license.

Two limits attach once that paper is used.

The federal registration cannot authorize activities beyond the scope of the state credential used to support it.⁷

The federal paper is also tethered to the life of the state paper. Suspension, revocation, or expiration of the state license automatically suspends the DEA registration.⁸ South Dakota already wrote a state enforcement chapter. Health can suspend an establishment certificate under chapter 34-20G and Article 44:90:12, including specified terms under 44:90:12:04 and 44:90:12:05.⁹ The April text adds a second consequence the current 44:90 package does not address: when the first desk moves, the second desk moves with it.

What the texts do not say about the suspended shop

Automatic suspension answers the status of the registration. It does not, by itself, answer every operational consequence of that status. Section 1301.13(k)(3) says “automatically suspended.” It does not say in that paragraph that the registration is cancelled or terminated, prescribe a South Dakota-specific reinstatement procedure, or enumerate every activity prohibited or permitted during the suspension.¹⁰

Article 44:90 likewise does not publish a dual-desk protocol. It tells a South Dakota establishment what happens to the state certificate. It does not tell that establishment which federal activities, if any, remain permissible on the day Health suspends the certificate. That is not a finding that activity continues. It is not a finding that activity ends under every federal section at once. It is the unpublished remainder.

The text of § 1301.13(k)(3) states when automatic suspension occurs. It does not state in that paragraph what happens to the DEA registration when the state credential is later restored. This page does not assume either automatic restoration or a new federal filing requirement.¹¹ A shop that treats the federal registration as self-healing because the state paper came back is reading a sentence the regulation did not write. A shop that treats the federal registration as dead because the state paper moved is reading a stronger verb than “suspended.” The comment that belongs in the October 3 record is a question, not a prediction: does the Department’s enforcement analysis assume that a state suspension also parks the federal registration, and what, if anything, does the Department tell the shop about the federal paper if the state credential returns?

Manufacturer obligations the state code does not answer

State-law deference in subsection (k) is not the whole federal file. Paragraph (k)(8) lets a registrant follow state labeling and packaging, subject to the warning in 21 U.S.C. § 825(c).¹² Paragraph (k)(9) lets disposal follow state law.¹³ Paragraph (k)(10) treats physical security as sufficient if the shop meets state law.¹⁴ Those are the DEFER rows from the crosswalk.

Paragraph (k)(6) is not a DEFER row. It imposes Single Convention machinery on registered manufacturers, including a nominal-price purchase-and-resale mechanism, DEA access to stored crops, and specified cultivation areas.¹⁵ Article 44:90 has camera, alarm, inventory, and co-location rules.¹⁶ It does not publish those treaty controls. A cultivation or manufacturing certificate that later sits under a federal manufacturer registration will meet 44:90 and still have federal questions 44:90 does not answer. That is not a finding that ordinary South Dakota establishments already carry those duties. It is a finding that manufacturer registration, if obtained, carries federal obligations the current rule package does not map. Testing is still not named as its own (k) class.¹⁷

Where state compliance answers the federal question, and where it does not

State compliance answers the federal question where the April text says it does: security for a (k) registrant, disposal for a (k) registrant, labeling and packaging for a (k) registrant subject to the federal warning.¹⁸

State compliance does not, by itself, answer:

whether a particular South Dakota certificate is the “State medical marijuana license” used in the definition;¹⁹

whether the federal registration’s scope was drawn more broadly than the certificate;²⁰

what a shop may do on the day the certificate is suspended and the federal registration is automatically suspended;²¹

what happens to the federal registration if the state credential is later restored;²²

whether a manufacturer’s Single Convention duties under (k)(6) are satisfied by 44:90 cameras and inventory logs.²³

Those are the dual-desk questions. They are not a new ban. They are the machinery the last page flagged and this page names.

What this page does not do

It does not say every South Dakota establishment must hold a DEA registration. Unpublished at the state level; the April text creates a pathway; the current 44:90 notice does not assign the filing.

It does not say a Health suspension is a federal raid. The regulation suspends the federal registration. It does not write the rest of the enforcement file.

It does not say the Department must amend the 38-section package before October 3. The notice invites amendments, data, opinions, and arguments.²⁴ A comment that quotes § 1301.13(k)(3) and asks whether Form 14, the corrective-action rule, or the regulatory-impact analysis assumed a live federal registration is a comment. A comment that announces a lockout the Department has not published is not.

The question left on both desks

South Dakota can suspend the certificate. The April text then automatically suspends the federal registration. Scope cannot exceed the state paper. Manufacturer registration adds treaty machinery 44:90 does not write. What happens after the state credential returns is unpublished.

The last page was the figure. This page is the tether. The Department can still say, in the October 3 record, how it reads both.

Footnotes

¹ Jason Karimi, Part 1301 Defers Security to State Law. Article 44:90 Never Mentions Part 1301, WeedPress (Sept. 22, 2026), https://weedpress.org/2026/09/22/part-1301-defers-security-to-state-law-article-4490-never-mentions-part-1301/; 21 C.F.R. § 1301.13(k)(3) (as amended Apr. 28, 2026), https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-21/chapter-II/part-1301/section-1301.13.

² 21 C.F.R. § 1301.13(k)(3); Schedules of Controlled Substances: Rescheduling of Food and Drug Administration Approved Products Containing Marijuana From Schedule I to Schedule III; Corresponding Change to Permit Requirements, 91 Fed. Reg. 22,714, 22,721 (Apr. 28, 2026), https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2026-04-28/pdf/2026-08176.pdf.

³ S.D. Legislative Research Council, South Dakota Register, Vol. 53, at 25 (Aug. 31, 2026), https://sdlegislature.gov/; S.D. Dep’t of Health, proposed amendments to ARSD art. 44:90 (filed Aug. 21, 2026).

⁴ 21 C.F.R. § 1301.13(k); 91 Fed. Reg. at 22,721.

⁵ 21 C.F.R. § 1300.01 (definition of “State medical marijuana license”); 91 Fed. Reg. at 22,721.

⁶ ARSD 44:90:03, https://sdlegislature.gov/Rules/Administrative/44:90:03; Jason Karimi, The April Rescheduling Order Asks for a License. Pierre Issues Four Certificates, WeedPress (Sept. 11, 2026), https://weedpress.org/2026/09/11/the-april-rescheduling-order-asks-for-a-license-pierre-issues-four-certificates/.

⁷ 21 C.F.R. § 1301.13(k)(3); 91 Fed. Reg. at 22,721.

⁸ Id.

⁹ SDCL ch. 34-20G, https://sdlegislature.gov/Statutes/34-20G; ARSD 44:90:12, https://sdlegislature.gov/Rules/Administrative/44:90:12; ARSD 44:90:12:04; ARSD 44:90:12:05.

¹⁰ 21 C.F.R. § 1301.13(k)(3); 91 Fed. Reg. at 22,721.

¹¹ Id.

¹² 21 C.F.R. § 1301.13(k)(8); 21 U.S.C. § 825(c), https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/21/825; 91 Fed. Reg. at 22,721–22.

¹³ 21 C.F.R. § 1301.13(k)(9); 91 Fed. Reg. at 22,722.

¹⁴ 21 C.F.R. § 1301.13(k)(10); 91 Fed. Reg. at 22,722.

¹⁵ 21 C.F.R. § 1301.13(k)(6); 91 Fed. Reg. at 22,721; Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs, 1961, art. 23, 18 U.S.T. 1407.

¹⁶ ARSD 44:90:04, https://sdlegislature.gov/Rules/Administrative/44:90:04; ARSD 44:90:11, https://sdlegislature.gov/Rules/Administrative/44:90:11.

¹⁷ 21 C.F.R. § 1301.13(k)(1); Jason Karimi, Part 1301 Defers Security to State Law. Article 44:90 Never Mentions Part 1301, WeedPress (Sept. 22, 2026), https://weedpress.org/2026/09/22/part-1301-defers-security-to-state-law-article-4490-never-mentions-part-1301/.

¹⁸ 21 C.F.R. § 1301.13(k)(8)–(10); 91 Fed. Reg. at 22,721–22.

¹⁹ 21 C.F.R. § 1300.01; ARSD 44:90:03.

²⁰ 21 C.F.R. § 1301.13(k)(3).

²¹ Id.

²² This question is not answered by the text of § 1301.13(k)(3). That paragraph states the trigger for automatic suspension. It does not prescribe what follows if the state credential is later restored.

²³ 21 C.F.R. § 1301.13(k)(6).

²⁴ S.D. Legislative Research Council, South Dakota Register, Vol. 53, at 25 (Aug. 31, 2026), https://sdlegislature.gov/; Jason Karimi, How to File a Written Comment on South Dakota’s 38-Rule Medical Cannabis Package, WeedPress (Sept. 21, 2026), https://weedpress.org/2026/09/21/how-to-file-a-written-comment-on-south-dakotas-38-rule-medical-cannabis-package/.

Ecclesiastes 7

24 That which is far off, and exceeding deep, who can find it out?