Tennessee lawmakers aim to ban all forms of kratom

The Issue: 

April 16,2026

Senate passed SB1656...

On the way to Governor Lee's desk for him to sign into law. The law will go into effect July 1,2026 making it a class A misdemeanor for possession of kratom and a class C felony to sell/distribute.

 

Contact Governor Lee and ask him to veto this bill! Don't make us criminals for trying to live a better life. 

 

Governor Bill Lee

(615) 741-2001

Share your concerns with the Governor's Office at this link:

https://www.tn.gov/governor/contact-us/share-opinion.html

 

As of April 8,2026

HB 1649 has passed all the way through the House. The companion bill SB1656 is almost all the way through the Senate. It will likely be heard on the Senate Floor sometime next week. 

Once both bills are completely voted and passed through both the Senate and the House it goes to Governor Lee's desk for him to sign into law. 

(Scroll down to the updates section of the petition to see past updates that have been posted) 

 

As of February 8,2026 
Our goal is to make this page your go-to source for all the latest news about Tennessee’s proposal kratom ban bill. We will update the “current as of” date whenever new information is added. As of now, the current House and Senate bills include HB1647​/SB1655 (possession of kratom is a felony) and HB1649​/SB1656 (possession is a misdemeanor). As of Feb. 4, 2026, Representative Joe Towns and Senator Mark Pody submitted "Kratom Consumer Protection Act" bills to the House and Senate (HB2594​/SB2417). These bills provide sensible regulation through age limits (21+), alkaloid counts, labeling, packaging, and testing to keep natural kratom legal in Tennessee. We urge you to contact your representatives and ask them to support these bills. You can find your representative and their contact information here: http://wapp.capitol.tn.gov/Apps/fml/search

 

A brief summary: Tennessee lawmakers introduced legislation to ban all forms of kratom and criminalize possession 

In January 2026, Rep. Esther Helton-Haynes and Senator Todd Gardenhire introduced “Matthew Davenport’s Law,” which would ban kratom in Tennessee. Under this legislation:

• All forms of kratom—“any part of the mitragyna speciosa plant”—would be impacted, including both natural and synthetic forms.
• Possession of kratom would be a Class D felony or Class A misdemeanor, depending on the final version of the bill.
• The manufacture, delivery, or sale of kratom would be a felony.
• Testing must be performed for the presence of kratom in suspected cases of drug overdose.
• Kratom would become a drug (i.e., controlled substance).
• The above would take effect on July 1, 2026.

We urge law makers to reject this proposed law and instead pass sensible regulation that keeps natural kratom accessible for Tennesseans.

Additional details: legal precedence, scientific evidence, and personal experiences all support accessible natural kratom

Legal precedence

FDA statements about natural kratom

• In July 2025, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recommended the scheduling of certain 7-hydroxymitragynine (7-OH) products—and explicitly stated that it is not targeting “natural kratom leaf products.”
• During a related press conference, Dr. Marty Makary, the FDA commissioner, said that "one of the dangerous things about 7OH"is that it is often misrepresented as “kratom extract” or “enhanced kratom”—when, in reality, it is “an opioid.”
• Dr. Makary also stated the public-health risk of synthetic vs. natural kratom is "night and day"

Potential kratom ban of 2018

• The FDA threatened to schedule kratom in 2018, but a huge outpouring of scientific and community support ultimately prevented this change.
• In an opinion piece for the Chattanooga Times Free Press, Rep. Helton-Haynes writes, “I can't help but think how many lives might have been saved if these harmful substances were adequately classified almost a decade ago.”
• This sentiment ignores reality. After the FDA made its recommendation, Brett Grioir, in his deciding role as the Assistant Secretary for Health at the time, wrote the following. (Note, this hyperlink will immediately download Mr. Grioir’s letter to your device.)  

1.  Mitragynine does not meet the scheduling requirements for high-abuse potential.
2. The science surrounding kratom was still underdeveloped.
3. Scheduling kratom could create “significant risk of immediate adverse public health consequences for potentially millions of users.”

• In the end, this fact-based approach defeated the scheduling proposal.
• In the eight years since, even more Americans are regularly using kratom, and our scientific understanding of the plant has skyrocketed. Despite this (or because of it), the FDA has not reconsidered scheduling kratom; in fact, it is taking the opposite approach, explicitly stating in July 2025 that it is not targeting natural kratom for scheduling.

The state of natural kratom across the US

• Natural kratom is legal in most US states, with only six banning it outright.
• Among states where natural kratom is legal, 19 have adopted sensible regulation—age restrictions, testing, labeling—to better protect its citizens.

Conclusion

Banning natural kratom in Tennessee would run counter to current federal guidance and the approach taken by most US states. The FDA has clarified that it is not targeting natural kratom for scheduling, and only six states have enacted outright bans. These outcomes directly align to expanded scientific research and continued evaluation of kratom’s public-health profile. There is little justification for Tennessee to diverge from federal precedent and the approach of most states on natural kratom—that it should remain legal under sensible regulation. 

Scientific evidence

A 2022 assessment published in Frontiers in Pharmacology, a peer-reviewed and widely cited scientific journal, reviewed more than 100 studies conducted since the FDA’s 2018 finding that mitragynine did not meet scheduling requirements. The assessment concluded:

• “Public health is better served by assuring continued access to kratom products.”
• Kratom alkaloids are “safer and/or more effective medicines for treating pain, substances use disorders, and mood disorders.”                     
• Scheduling kratom would cause “serious adverse public health consequences,including potentially thousands of drug overdose deaths.”

Federal research supports these findings:

A 2024 FDA study found that natural kratom is “well-tolerated” up to 12 grams, which exceeds a typical serving size.
A 2024 National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) study similarly reported no adverse events for self-administered kratom up to 10.9 grams.

A 2022 Johns Hopkins Medical study concluded that kratom is more than “well-tolerated”—it can be “life-saving.”

Per that study: 

• Pain relief was the most cited reason for kratom use.
• More than one-third of participants used kratom as a substitute for opioids, alcohol, or stimulants, with many describing it as “life-saving.”
• Most participants “reported using kratom in a seemingly nonproblematic way,” suggesting low abuse potential.

Conclusion

There is simply no scientific basis for banning natural kratom. Scientific journals, federal government agencies, and academic institutions all agree that kratom is well-tolerated at the right dosage; its abuse potential is low; its analgesic properties are helping those with chronic pain; and, it’s a viable harm-reduction tool for those managing addictions. Kratom can help improve lives, and Tennessee, where chronic pain and addiction run rampant, should take its cues from these scientific findings.

Personal experiences

We would encourage everyone to read the user comments on this petition. Stories abound from kratom consumers that verify everything from the aforementioned studies: natural kratom is safe and an effective method for managing chronic pain and addiction. 

The reason I organized this petition is because I’ve been a kratom consumer for more than six years, and I’m living proof of the power of this natural plant. In 2005, I woke up one morning paralyzed from the neck down. I was eventually diagnosed with Transverse Myelitis and became a chronic pain patient. For years, prescription medications helped me function until increased DEA crackdowns and shifting laws left me without access to the medicine I needed. I was suffering every single moment of every day. That changed in May 2019 when I discovered whole leaf kratom powder. Since then, I’ve used it responsibly, and it has truly given me my life back. I can get out of bed, be a mom, go to school events, run errands, and live a life that’s no longer ruled by pain. Although I still have physical limitations, I am no longer confined by suffering.

Kratom has helped countless Tennesseans, like me, live a better life, and, because of that, banning it would do much more harm than good.

A word about Matthew Davenport

While we advocate for keeping natural kratom legal in Tennessee, we also recognize that Matthew Davenport’s death is a genuine tragedy. The grief surrounding his passing is real and deserves respect. At the same time, policymaking must consider the broader public-health implications for all Tennesseans.

Available evidence indicates that reported “kratom overdoses” overwhelmingly involve multiple substances, including in Mr. Davenport’s case—a point Rep. Helton-Haynes acknowledged in her Times Free Press opinion piece. When “kratom” or “mitragynine” appears in toxicology reports, it can sometimes overshadow the presence of other contributing substances, which may lead to incomplete public understanding of these incidents.

Effective policy must balance empathy for individual loss with careful evaluation of legal precedent, scientific evidence, and the experiences of constituents. A regulatory approach that keeps kratom legal through age restrictions, testing requirements, and labeling would better serve public health than an outright ban. The easy answer, of course, is to ban kratom. But the right answer—the answer that helps far more people than it harms—is to pass sensible kratom regulation.