Black's entrance into the race is likely to shake up what was once considered a cakewalk to the nomination for Chattah, an Israeli-born Las Vegas attorney best known for leading lawsuits challenging COVID restrictions. 

Lawmakers took a major step this session to expand and diversify the industry's disproportionately white and male ownership and also provide tourists with a place to legally consume marijuana by creating a new license type for cannabis consumption lounges.

Lawmakers ended the 81st session of the Legislature on Monday night passing dozens of high-profile measures but many others, including an effort to license midwives and a bill allowing casinos to prohibit firearms, failed to advance.

Friday marks the do-or-die moment for hundreds of legislative proposals — bills must pass out of their first committee unless they have a special exemption.

Proponents commissioned an analysis from RGC Economics that projected the state could support up to 1,283 additional dispensaries. Nevada's marijuana market grossed nearly $700 million last fiscal year and is on track to break that record this fiscal year.

Marijuana business owners and board members in Nevada are disproportionately white and male, while the industry workforce is made up of a greater proportion of people of color, according to a new demographic report on the state's cannabis industry.

Company officials said Nevada's stringent restrictions on marijuana businesses — Sisolak ordered them to move to delivery-only models and only recently opened to curbside pickup and then in-store sales — was a hard hit.

Nevada Dispensary Association Executive Director Riana Durrett said while delivery has kept many marijuana businesses going, most are doing just a fraction of the sales they were before and some are not participating at all because the process is "too difficult and inefficient."

With the number of coronavirus cases in the Silver State on the rise, The Nevada Independent will be keeping you up to date on the latest here.

Businesses of all stripes began to grapple with Sisolak's unprecedented announcement last night asking most businesses in the state to close, with some beginning to shut their doors around noon while others either continued operating in an unclear environment — workers at the Tesla Gigafactory outside of Reno reported to work on Wednesday, while construction at Allegiant Stadium continues to go forward and several marijuana dispensaries in Las Vegas said they would remain open for the time being.