2ESSB 5546 — Cannabis commission
2ESSB 5546 was introduced in the 2023-24 Washington legislative session by Senator Shewmake. It received 5 public hearings and did not become law.
Dying without a vote is the ordinary outcome for a Washington bill, not a scandal and not a failure of any one person. This page shows where it stopped, who was recorded, and what the record does not say.
- 2023-24 session
- Senate
- Did not become law
- 5 public hearings
- Sponsor: LC(Shewmake
Source Washington State Legislature web services: legislation, hearings and roll calls · as of 2026-08-12 · introduced 2023-02-14
01
Where it stopped
Died
- Last recorded action
- By resolution, returned to Senate Rules Committee for third reading.
- Position
- S Rules 3 — the Legislature's own location code
- Last committee
- House Regulated Substances & Gaming — the last committee with this bill on an agenda
- Public hearing
- Yes — 5 on record — a public hearing is where testimony is taken; an executive session is where a committee votes
Source WA Legislature legislation service · as of 2026-08-12
02
What it would do
The Legislature’s own description. We do not paraphrase legislation.
Establishing a Washington state cannabis commission.
Legal title AN ACT Relating to establishing a Washington state cannabis commission;
Source WA Legislature legislation service · as of 2026-08-12
03
The votes
Recorded floor votes. Committee votes are in the hearing record below.
SENATE · 2023-03-08
3rd Reading & Final Passage
40
yea
9
nay
SENATE · 2024-02-13
3rd Reading & Final Passage
29
yea
20
nay
Source WA Legislature roll call service · as of 2026-08-12 · 2 recorded votes
04
Sponsors
Who put their name to the bill. The Legislature records a prime sponsor on the bill status; the full co-sponsor roster appears only in the introduced bill text, which we have not ingested.
Prime sponsor
LC(Shewmake
as printed the sponsor line on the bill status record · introduced in the Senate. A committee substitute prints the committee here, with the originating member in parentheses.
The co-sponsor roster is not on this page. We hold the prime sponsor the Legislature prints on the bill status, not the list of co-sponsors, which is published only in the introduced bill text we have not ingested. A co-sponsor count here would be a number no record we hold contains.
Source WA Legislature legislation service · as of 2026-08-12
05
The hearing record
Every committee meeting where this bill appeared on the agenda. Public is where testimony is taken; Executive is where the committee votes.
| Date | Type | Committee | Chamber |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2023-02-09 | Public | Senate Labor & Commerce | Senate |
| 2023-02-14 | Executive | Senate Labor & Commerce | Senate |
| 2023-02-20 | Public | Senate Ways & Means | Senate |
| 2023-02-23 | Executive | Senate Ways & Means | Senate |
| 2023-03-20 | Public | House Regulated Substances & Gaming | House |
| 2023-03-21 | Public | House Regulated Substances & Gaming | House |
| 2023-03-27 | Executive | House Regulated Substances & Gaming | House |
| 2024-02-19 | Public | House Regulated Substances & Gaming | House |
Source WA Legislature committee hearing records · as of 2026-08-12 · 5 public, 3 executive
06
What changed between versions
| Version | Substitute | Engrossed | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| SB 5546 | — | — | 1st substitute bill substituted. |
| 2ESSB 5546 | 1 | 2 | By resolution, returned to Senate Rules Committee for third reading. |
We do not hold the bill text, so we cannot say what changed. The version list shows that the bill was rewritten and how many times. Comparing the substance of two versions needs the text of each, which we have not ingested. The Legislature publishes both.
Last checked 2026-08-12
Source WA Legislature legislation service · as of 2026-08-12
07
Connected records
Every link in this section is an edge in the entity graph: a row in one table, carrying the document that states it. Grouped by how well the record supports it.
Composite · 1
Two documents joined on a key, and the key is named here.
-
DIED IN · biennium 2023-24
House Regulated Substances & Gaming
joined on: cutoff calendar + last journal action
SB 5546 status history, 2023-24 — bill summary, WA State Legislature · as of 2024-03-07
Source Entity graph, synced from the pipeline · as of 2026-08-12 · Votes are in the graph but render as roll-call tables above, not as rows here. Hearings, referrals and companion bills are not in the graph yet.
08
What this page will not compute
Each of these is a number a reader might reasonably expect. None of them follow from the records we hold, so we do not publish them.
- Who killed it
- We can say a bill was never scheduled for a public hearing. We cannot say who decided that. Chairs control agendas, but the record does not attribute a non-decision to a person, and we will not infer one from a committee roster.
- Why it died
- Withdrawn, superseded by its own companion, folded into a budget, or simply never taken up — all four look identical in the data.
- Whether lobbying affected it
- Washington collects lobbyist compensation and employer registrations, but none of those filings name a bill. There is no documented link between a lobbying report and a bill number, so we publish none.
- What changed between versions
- We hold the version list, not the text of each version.
- How a member would have voted
- Only recorded votes appear here. A member absent from a roll call is recorded as absent, not as opposed.
09
Common questions
- What happened to 2ESSB 5546?
- 2ESSB 5546 did not become law. It stopped in House Regulated Substances & Gaming. The 2023-24 session ended without it passing both chambers, so it is not law.
- Who sponsored 2ESSB 5546?
- The prime sponsor of record is LC(Shewmake, as printed on the bill status. This page does not list co-sponsors — that roster is published only in the introduced bill text, which we have not ingested.
- What would 2ESSB 5546 do?
- In the Legislature’s own description: “Establishing a Washington state cannabis commission.” We quote the official language rather than summarising, because a paraphrase of legislation is an interpretation.
- Was there a recorded vote on 2ESSB 5546?
- Yes. 2 recorded floor votes appear on this page, member counts and all. Committee votes are held separately as scanned sign-off sheets and are not counted here.
- Did 2ESSB 5546 get a public hearing?
- Yes — 5 public hearings are on record. A public hearing is where testimony is taken; it is not the committee vote, which happens in an executive session.
Cite this page
This is public-records reporting. Use it, and say where it came from.
“2ESSB 5546 — Cannabis commission,” WashingtonIndependents.org, data as of 2026-08-12, accessed 2026-08-20. https://washingtonindependents.org/bill/2023-24-sb-5546/
10
How this page is built
Every figure above is read from a primary source and rebuilt on a schedule. Nothing here is modelled or inferred; where a source is silent the page says so rather than filling the gap.
- WA Legislature legislation service
- Bill id, titles, sponsor, introduced date, and the history line and location code we render as its status.
- WA Legislature committee hearing records
- Every committee agenda this bill appeared on, and whether each was a public hearing or an executive session.
- WA Legislature roll call service
- Recorded floor votes, member by member.
- Outcome
- Derived, not published by the Legislature. Enacted means a chapter number or effective date is on record; died is only ever assigned once a session has ended; a sitting session yields pending and no death is asserted.
- Not loaded
- Bill text, amendments, committee votes as individual member records, testimony, and fiscal notes.