Ben Larson: 0:00

This is the final straw Like. This is just a state that didn't legalize cannabis. It was all performative, the entire thing Since 2016,. It's been performative legalization and all they've done since 2016 is try to kill the cannabis industry. I was here, you were here during the Prop 215 days. Those are the good old days. Hey everybody, welcome to episode 95 of High Spirits. I'm Ben Larson and with me, as always, is Anna Rae Grabstein, recording Thursday July 1st 2025. And I'm back from vacation. Good thing, nothing big happened over the last two weeks. We have a cannabis business news roundup for you. This week. We'll be talking about the veto of SB3 in Texas. We have North Carolina and the gutting of House Bill 328. We have an appropriations bill, a big, beautiful bill. Many, many things to talk about, and we'll get there. But first I need to check in with my co-host, anna Rae. Anna Rae, how are you doing? Do you miss me?

AnnaRae Grabstein: 1:13

I'm good. I miss you so much, ben. You've been in Japan texting me incredible photos of food which I can't wait to hear all about Me. I have been working away the crazy wilds of summer and cannabis, uh. But the big news you know on the home front is that my kid is at summer camp for the first time ever.

Ben Larson: 1:34

Sleep away camp oh, sleep away camp yeah, you're basically like having vacation at home that's exactly right.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 1:43

So I, what my husband and I talked about, was like, well, should we go out of town? It was like heck, no, we should stay home. Our kid, isn't here.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 1:53

And so we decided that we were going to cancel dinner, Like we aren't allowed to talk about dinner all week, which if you are a parent you know it's kind of like the bane of all parents. Existence is to what is for dinner. So we're still eating in the evenings, but we're not using the word dinner, and it might just like be whatever's in the fridge or a snack at the cheese plate.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 2:15

It's exactly right and like a lot of desserts, so many desserts. And so, to top it all off, we have a hot tub in our backyard. It's beautiful, sonoma County. We we had our not dinner at about 9pm last night and then we went out into the hot tub for like a lovely no kid evening and we were basking in the glory. After about 10 minutes I looked at my husband and I said do you smell that it's taking a turn? It's taking a turn. He said no, what are you talking about? It smells something funny. The hot tub is it mildewy? What's going on? Our hot tub is always really pristine and nice and he turns on the light in the hot tub, which we had had off. It was dark and lovely and there were dead frogs in. Oh, no.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 3:02

Yeah, all romance averted Mood killer. And I was like I screamed. I get out, I wrap my towel around myself. I look at him like, uh-oh, do you need my help? What do I do? I need to take a shower. I'm going to smell you frogs too and run inside. So anyway, it's the adventures of of being childless. Is is not as quite romantical as we are hoping so far, but we're working on it and it's been great either way.

Ben Larson: 3:33

So I'm I'm doing well. Thanks to the frogs for keeping the show PG All right. We we also were childish, childish. We were childish and childless for two weeks, which was really incredible.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 3:48

Isn't it funny how you get rid of your kids and then you actually become childish again. I love that you said that, yeah.

Ben Larson: 3:54

Yeah, freudian slip, but your schedule becomes whatever it is that you want, you eat whatever you want, you do whatever you want, and the only thing different now is that hopefully you have money to do it right. And there were hot tubs, there was a lot of great food, incredible sites. My first day there, it was a combination of me being alone. I didn't meet up with my wife until three days later and I was around Tokyo. I was getting reacquainted with my camera and fighting, making sure I didn't get jet lag. So I got like 30,000 steps in my first day and I saw a ton of Tokyo and I just it was a blast, it was hot, it was, it was. It was hot and humid. So there's a lot of sweat, but I also just put it in my head. I'm like, oh, it's like being in a sauna all day and, yeah, it was a great time.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 4:45

That's so cool. I can't wait to go to Japan. You've really inspired me, tell me a little bit the cannabis scene is like in Japan, non-existent.

Ben Larson: 4:55

I mean, I saw two CBD shops in two different cities. There was some CBD gummies I saw that were oddly, I will say, here in the US we're hyper aware of making sure that we're not advertising to children, be it hemp or alcohol. I know alcohol is a little bit of a slippery conversation, but for the most part there's alcohol sections and it's clear. We were walking around some stores where you'd be looking at Legos and then all of a sudden you look to the right and there's like a handle of whiskey and then you turn a little bit further and then there's the 18 only section where there's like vibrators and all this kind of stuff and it's all branded the same.

Ben Larson: 5:35

It's like big, bold, cute cartoons and I'm just I'm like holy shit, like norm, our friend at the fda would just have a heart attack walking through, uh, this grocery store and so, yeah, that part was interesting, but I didn't smell weed for two weeks and that was really interesting because anytime you're walking around here, especially in the bay area, you know you walk around the corner, you get, you get hit with a nice cloud and, depending on who you are, you either really enjoy it or you're disgusted. Um. Myself I love the smell of weed and so that was like that was an interesting aspect. So we have some work to do there, but otherwise, dream vacation. Everything is so well organized, so efficient, such like a hospitality bent to everything, like nothing is. There's just no entitlement from the service side. Right, they live to serve and they take such pride in everything they do, from the food to the crossing guards. I wrote a post about it on linkedin, posted some pictures, yeah, but yeah, it's just really impressed I.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 6:39

hospitality is something that is sorely lacking in the US these days. I think the pandemic killed service. I grew up in a restaurant. My family ran an Italian restaurant and I would spend after school days there, and then, once I got my first job, I worked in a coffee shop in high school and I think that hospitality prepared me for cannabis just as well as my business school MBA education did.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 7:06

It was to learn about serving people, because this really is a service business, and thinking about what it is that people want, meeting them where they are those are all things that you learn in such a hands-on way when you work in the service space, so it's good to see that service is still alive somewhere.

Ben Larson: 7:22

Yeah, no, it's something I'm hyper aware of and, like you know, I'm still I'm a little old school in that fashion like it significantly affects the tip that I want to give and I say want because I I'm also a generous giver. I spent time as a server in college and I think that people that do do hospitality of some sort, or even just retail, like where you have to serve the customer at an early age, like it shapes you and so oftentimes when I'm interviewing people I'll ask them I'm like, what did you do in college to make money or to get by? And I think it's just very telling about, like, how that person is wired obviously doesn't determine whether they're hired or not, but certainly gives them some bonus points if they say they were a waiter or a busser or or a bag person amazing.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 8:13

Uh well, we have missed all of you. To our listeners out there, ben and I have been separate. Now this is. It's been three weeks since we've recorded together. There's two episodes this is our longest break since we started and it's episode 95, 95 it's a lot, and it's it's been two years since we've been doing this every week with y'all, so, um, thanks everyone for for coming and let's jump in.

Ben Larson: 8:38

Let's, uh, let's talk about texas, texas yeah, so texas governor greg abbott, texas yeah.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 8:44

So Texas Governor Greg Abbott shocked the cannabis world when he vetoed SB3, maybe shocked some people. Other people worked really hard to get that veto, preserving the state's hemp industry for now.

Ben Larson: 8:58

Yeah.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 8:59

But what is about to happen, Ben?

Ben Larson: 9:02

Yeah. So there's a special session starting in 20 days where the legislature will come together and try to decide on the path forward and this will determine what the hemp situation is in Texas for the next two years and it'll be final right. And so I think there's a lot of people that are saying, yes, we want regulations, we just don't want prohibition, and there's a little theme that is starting to roll out across the US about this. But I think, as long as those regulations aren't hyper restrictive and look a lot like the CUP program, that people will generally be happy.

Ben Larson: 9:38

A lot of the hemp industry has been calling for regulations and structure and things that make public safety feel safe, but what we also might get is just the status quo, which is this crazy hemp industry that is totally growing and on fire and, I think, anywhere between those two. Personally, I'm happy. I was laying in bed in Japan and got news that the veto came through and I was tracking it very closely and, yeah, it was just one of those moments. I'm like holy shit, it happened and there was just so much that went into that and so many jobs, so much revenue and a signaling to the rest of the hemp and cannabis industry about where reefer madness is places in society these days.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 10:27

Well, there was a lot of reefer madness leading up to this veto and a lot of misinformation in Texas about the difference between cannabis and hemp and and how, what was happening to people as a result of consuming cannabis, and just a lot of fear, which was really, really disheartening for people who spend a lot of time good people trying to do the right thing.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 10:48

At the same time, we know that there has been a lack of oversight in Texas and I think what the governor is calling for is more guardrails and I'm interested to see what those guardrails are and if certain products or form factors are reined in in Texas and if there's potency restrictions or limitations, especially because, while the governor vetoed the hemp prohibition, he greenlit the expansion of the medical program and now the regulators are required by the end of the year to license nine additional medical providers in Texas and a total of 15 licenses need to be issued by April of next year, which means that there is going to be more competition and business happening in the medical space in Texas and those folks are going to need to be set up to succeed and I do think that the legislature, as they're considering the governor's request to regulate the industry, are going to be weighing what is the right path for both spaces to exist, so that there can be differentiation between what's happening in the medical market and what's happening in the hemp side of the market.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 12:02

But we know that things are complicated because the industry got really big without oversight in the state, and so there's a lot of people that have a lot to lose, and we'll see what happens starting on July 21st.

Ben Larson: 12:14

Yeah, yeah, and I'm interested to see how it affects the conversation going into 2026, not to put the cart before the horse, but like we see what can happen if we don't get proactive about putting in regulations that do promote public safety and some control, responsible control and so maybe what this will do is create a lot more opportunity for seeing proactive hemp bills coming to the table for the 2026 legislative session proactive hemp bills coming to the table for the 2026 legislative session.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 12:53

I agree, and I think that had the governor decided to let SB3 move forward instead of veto it, there was a lot of indication that other states would take that as a signal as well. So hopefully this is going to be a signal that Texas is going to be a leader here and do something that's good. This is going to be a signal that.

Ben Larson: 13:04

Texas is going to be a leader here and do something. That's, that's good, yeah. The immediate one that followed was was North Carolina right, like there was House Bill 328, the Protecting Our Community Act. It surfaced very close to the end of session and was being railroaded through, and it basically was another prohibition to hemp like movement and, long story short, all that came out of it really was seemed to be uh, the 21 age restriction and then removing synthetic cannabinoids, and so I think this is another example that we need regulations and not prohibition, and I just wonder it's like it has happened in such close concert with what happened in Texas Like, would that outcome have been different had Texas not done the veto?

AnnaRae Grabstein: 13:54

Yeah, what occurs to me when I see this North Carolina update is that this is really becoming adult use cannabis. When a state moves to regulate hemp, like what North Carolina is doing, they're creating a system to access cannabinoids, and in a state like North Carolina that does not have an adult use cannabis program, they're doing that type of work, as they're thinking about it, that we've seen happen in other states with cannabis programs, and just doing it within a different ecosystem in terms of the input ingredient that these products are going to have and opening up different channels for retail access and consumers to access these products. But it just reminds me of the ways that states have discussed what type of regulations they want for adult use cannabis and now they're just using those same ideas and, instead of prohibiting these products, they're thinking about how to make it safe for people to be able to access them. So I like to see it.

Ben Larson: 14:59

Yeah yeah, another version of red state weed. Like what we talked about with Hersh back on episode 36.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 15:07

Yeah, that's right.

Ben Larson: 15:08

Yeah, but you know, all this might be moot in the future Hopefully not, probably not, I'd like to say but there's some pretty big, scary things happening at the federal level. I think we should talk about that first before we settle on our home state of california, which is its own hot mess of a situation. So there's like multiple big bills, some of them beautiful. Uh, that are, I think ugly, ugly, ugly, ugly.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 15:39

Bills, ugly, ugly bills.

Ben Larson: 15:41

Not beautiful big ugly bills some of them called the big beautiful bill that have very significant impacts on cannabis and hemp. So which one do you want to start with? The appropriations bill, the big beautiful bill?

AnnaRae Grabstein: 15:56

Yeah, let's talk about the appropriations bill. I talked about getting in my hot tub last night and it being like smelly frog soup. That's what the appropriations bill is. This is some smelly frog soup. That's what the appropriations bill is. This is some smelly frog soup. This is controversial language that could redefine hemp in a way that would virtually ban all consumable products that are intoxicating in any way. So, really, thc and everything that is like thc yeah, that is what is being proposed in this bill.

Ben Larson: 16:27

Yeah, and it's complicated. There's the fiscal year 25 appropriations bill where this first came up, so this became an issue last year. I don't know how much attention it got not much, but the Miller Amendment the famous Miller Amendment that was presented in the farm bill was also put into the Appropriations Bill for fiscal year 2025. And, like every well-run business, fiscal year 2025 Appropriations Bill has not been passed yet. That needs to pass by September. So good job our government in passing your Appropriations Bill in September of the year of which you're operating. Anyways, fiscal year 26 is now also being discussed. This language has also been included in the fiscal year 26 bill, but obviously 25 has to get settled before 26. And either way, both are being discussed. We need to fix this. And appropriations, as this discussion is suggesting, visited every year, and so now hemp regulation is starting to be included into an annually visited bill, which is just problematic. We don't want to be fighting for our lives every single year and in this particular case, it's an existential crisis, so it needs to be addressed.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 17:45

And, that said, there is not bipartisan or even within the party's agreement over this issue. Senator Rand Paul has introduced the Hemp Act, and the Hemp Act seeks to raise THC limits, as part of the definition of hemp, to 1% from 0.3%, and this is looked at as a countermeasure to preserve market access as opposed to limit it. And Rand Paul is from the majority party, the Republicans. So I think it remains to be seen whether the Republicans that are pushing forward different temp language, be it a prohibition or an expansion, are going to step up and make this an issue worth fighting for, or if this language will just get stripped from appropriations in order to be able to move forward able to move forward.

Ben Larson: 18:45

Well, and I think it'll be, probably at the moment, I think it'll be really telling of the, the political chess that goes on and in all of this you know, like we were just talking about north carolina and texas and the signaling that those leaders want to see a regulated hemp industry to serve their constituents. Those are the same constituents that those on the Hill, the senators and house representatives, are supposed to represent. It's just like a topsy-turvy upside down world when you're comparing the state level actions and what's happening at the federal level. But at some point it's all going to have to come together. And I'm a business person. I'm merely reporting, kind of like, my observations of this. I'm not a political pundit, anna Rae, I don't know how you want to identify, but Not a political pundit.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 19:31

The way that I see all of this is like what I'm trying to learn and best understand in order to metabolize it, to understand what the opportunities are for the businesses that I'm working with and that we're talking to, because that's the reality is that these laws, these regulations, have real implications to the people who are living out the execution on the ground and all these different states and markets, and whether or not the politicians remember it, does really affect lives and opportunity, yeah, and so my point here is if you're listening to this and be like these guys are idiots like I know what's happening Please reach out, let us know.

Ben Larson: 20:11

We'll get you on the show and you can give us the real, the real news that's happening either on the Hill or in the States, but I don't think anyone really knows. I think what this administration has proven to us is that they like the art of the deal and they like to keep people on their toes and on their heels or whichever one is the right analogy here. But I feel like I'm on both. I'm rocking from my heels to my toes and I'm just trying to navigate it the best that I can.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 20:38

With that. Our understanding is that inside the big beautiful, stinky bill that is moving through the Senate as we record that, there is language to strip prior protections of state programs from federal enforcement from a budgetary perspective. And so this was a measure that the feds have for years chosen not to put money behind efforts to enforce federal prohibitions in states that have legal programs. And our understanding is that the big beautiful bill will remove that, that budget prohibition, and empower the federal government to use, to use their money however they want and if they want to be able to go after state programs, they could um yeah, which there.

Ben Larson: 21:35

There's so many concerning things about this and many different just threads that my brain starts to take so. So one of them the the actions that the current administration has been taking through ICE and how a lot of those attacks seem to be happening in city centers in democratic states. So when I see something like this, I'm like it's a removal of barriers and it's giving them leverage to use tools to do whatever the hell they want, wherever they want. This might be bad if you're a regulated cannabis operator. I'd be extremely scared if I was a regulated cannabis operator in a blue state. Or maybe it's just a way for the federal government to go after the state government and loot their coffers for once, instead of ours.

Ben Larson: 22:19

The other thing is is just that I don't know it removes this moral high ground that the regulated cannabis operators often exert over the proliferating intoxicating hemp market. Right, it's like now we're both on unsteady ground and we're all fighting the same fight, and we've been having this conversation intoxicating hemp is cannabis and all that fight, and we've been having this conversation hemp, intoxicating hemp is cannabis and all all that. And so it's like kind of levels, the playing field as far as like we're all fucking breaking the law at this point, we're all at risk and yeah, yeah, it's very unsettling I, I do.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 22:56

I.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 22:56

I think that you're queuing in on something that is very true, which is the performative nature of a lot of the enforcement that's been coming down in the federal level.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 23:06

Certainly what you were talking about about city centers, like what happened in Los Angeles, and there was a whole bunch of National Guard folks that, after things died down in Los Angeles, were deployed as part of a huge bust of an illegal, illicit, unregulated part of a huge bust of an illegal, illicit, unregulated, unlicensed growing operation in the desert in California. But it played into this performative nature of putting law enforcement's enforcement actions against different things happening in states more in the public's eyes. I think that there has been law enforcement and and and things coming up for a long time, but this administration is making a point to make sure that it's it's ending up in people's social feeds and that there's video and cameras there documenting this type of enforcement to really scare people. And I'm not feeling that. So I would like it if the feds would let our businesses move forward with some type of confidence and some federal reform would be awesome, but less prohibition would also be a great great step.

Ben Larson: 24:16

Speaking of performative politics, should we move to California?

AnnaRae Grabstein: 24:20

Oh yeah, let's talk about California.

Ben Larson: 24:23

What's happening in California.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 24:24

So there's a lot happening in California. Today is July 1. And unfortunately in California that means that the cannabis excise tax at the retail level for consumers today just increased 25%. It went up from 15% to 19%, and that's just the state excise tax. So if you're a cannabis consumer at a dispensary you are likely also paying sales tax, which is somewhere between nine and ten percent plus the cannabis excise tax. Plus there might also be other taxes at a local level, a cannabis tax that is not a state tax but is a municipal tax. So it gets up close to 50% in some places.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 25:07

And this was a massive, massive disappointment to the California cannabis industry that lobbied really hard to get an emergency stop to this tax increase. And this is after there was a bill that has continued to move through 546, sponsored by Matt Haney of San Francisco, to stop this tax increase, but that is moving through the regular legislative process and might not get signed even until September, if at all. And so in the meantime this cannabis tax is happening, tax is happening, and a few days ago Governor Newsom loudly came out and said if the legislature puts something in front of me to sign, I will stop the increase in cannabis taxes, knowing clear well that there wasn't a pathway for the legislature to put something in front of him that quickly. I think that's that performativeness that maybe you are referring to. So we should pause. Let's talk about the taxes. But there's some other important stuff going on in California, also on the regulatory side, with testing pesticides and molds as well. What do you think about all this tax stuff, ben?

Ben Larson: 26:19

I just this is me biting my tongue and not exploding but like Newsome, when he decides he doesn't want something, he has proven that he is willing to be creative and wield a sword and ban the hemp industry.

Ben Larson: 26:39

He did that very quickly the hemp industry he did that very quickly, and now he is virtue, signaling His support so clearly of the cannabis industry Because he could do something. He allowed the Senate To block and strip the tax freeze Out of the current bill, and so, if you're going to help, actually help Like. He deserves every f***ing title that people have given him over the years New scum, whatever you want to call him he is and I hope he runs for president so that the entire state of California can light him up for how s how he's been as a representative of the people who, yeah, I think that Newsom has, on the surface, been a proponent of legal cannabis, but when the industry has really needed him, he has not been here for us, and this tax issue just seals the deal so it's crazy, it's like to fix this

Ben Larson: 27:46

people. People know like I'm involved in both the hemp and cannabis side, but we've been a we've been a licensed cannabis entity since 2018 and we've been supportive of this category. I'm supportive of this industry and have tried to like work our way through it, but this is the final straw. This is just a state that didn't legalize cannabis. It was all performative the entire thing since 2016,. It's been performative legalization. All they've done since 2016 is try to kill the cannabis industry. I was here, you were here during the Prop 215 days. Those are the good old days.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 28:22

People made money. They were happy, patients were well served, lots of products in the market. We needed some quality control. There needed to be some regulatory framework for businesses to be able to have confidence and succeed, but what we got with Prop 64 has been a disaster. And in the midst of all of this, while this tax increase is coming, it's on the back of the regulatory agency in the state, the DC. This, while this tax increase is coming, it's on the back of the regulatory agency in the state, the DCC, also announcing that they're down 11% year over year in their tax collection, and that is because the industry is shrinking. And if they think that raising the taxes is going to do anything other than continue to harm the top line performance of anyone that's still alive in this market, they are sorely mistaken. This is a big mistake.

Ben Larson: 29:11

This is why the Democratic Party has a huge branding issue and I said we're not political pundits, we're not going to dive too deep into that. But you have New York electing a socialist mayor, you have whatever the hell's happening here in california, but they're killing capitalism, and capitalism is the one thing that has made california great. It's the reason we get to claim being the fourth largest economy in the world. But that's not going to happen. If you keep killing businesses and saying that we need to move 15 tax up to 19% tax, like you're going to force out all the business and you're going to kill companies.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 29:46

Yeah, and on that note, there is other regulatory stuff on the docket. In California. There's an open comment period right now for an increase to pesticide requirements for all cannabis traveling through the legal supply chain for all cannabis traveling through the legal supply chain and while this, on its head, is not a bad thing and safety is super paramount and I don't want any harmful pesticides to be present in products for humans in the supply chain we also have a big problem going on in the state of California with the microbiological contamination requirements as well, and there is a detect or no detect, pass or fail requirement for Aspergillus, and it's causing a lot of punitive damage across the supply chain. And I just need the state of California and the whole industry to really think about creating quality control standards that are based in science and safety and not fear and lack of knowledge, because what we're seeing is companies that are truly being harmed by getting these fails of whole batches of product for aspergillus, and I'm just not convinced that this is good science.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 31:07

And Connected Cannabis, one of the most impactful, large, well-known brands in the state, just filed a suit yesterday suing the Department of Cannabis Control alleging that their recall process is unfair and punitive and that this whole Aspergillus system is broken. And the state of Oregon had a similar lawsuit a couple of years ago and the cannabis operators won and they rolled back some of the aspergillus requirements. And I think the state of California needs to take a really hard look at the environment that they're creating for operators and make sure that, as they're balancing public safety, that they're also looking at real science and not over-regulating the industry to a place that it just becomes impossible to produce product here, which is what it seems like they're doing.

Ben Larson: 31:55

I mean I feel like I get a DCC recall notice every day and I thought the point of testing requirements was to avoid that. So just the whole system seems broken. Yeah, I hear you and it would be great politics could involve science a lot more. Like that. That statement can be included in any one of these conversations that we've been talking about, about hemp or cannabis, anything. It's just like it comes up when we talk about converted or or synthetic cannabinoids like there's good science that proves, like that is a very viable way to support a supply chain. But politicians are just, they get scared and they're looking for a quick fix so they say ban it.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 32:39

and it's just, it's untenable, it's not serving the people yeah, it's untenable, and we we both started our cannabis careers here in the state of California, and so we have an outsized commitment and dedication to hoping that we can figure this out. And it's it's not clear how it's all going to move forward, and it seems like what the state operators in California are having to spend time doing is fighting against it getting worse, and that just seems absolutely absurd when the state should be locking arms with the licensed canvas operators right now to figure out how to open up a clear path for them to succeed. If they're going to do things like shut down the hemp industry that was just getting started in the state, they need to face head on that the environment that they're created for the legal operators is not working either. Otherwise, they're just creating this massive opportunity for the illicit cannabis market to to flourish.

Ben Larson: 33:40

Yeah. Yeah, it's wild man. That was a roller coaster. I started out feeling very positive about things and sorry everyone for all the F-bombs, but you start talking about California and the reality that we've been living for the last eight plus years 10 years, I guess you know, you and I have tried to take a fairly neutral position.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 34:05

in a lot of ways. We clearly have a have a position when it comes to cannabis reform, but we have been careful about pointing the finger at at Newsom or at Trump and everyone in between, because we haven't wanted to box people out and we've wanted to remain a place where everybody felt like they could be a part of this conversation. But it's kind of escalating recently and it's and it's time to just say it how it is and to speak truth to power a little bit. So, uh, I feel a little bit more emboldened than I have before.

Ben Larson: 34:38

I mean, I mean it's kind of like what do we have to lose Right? Might as well be real, yeah, and it's and it's not like it's Republican of like what do we have to lose right?

AnnaRae Grabstein: 34:42

might as well be real yeah and it's, and it's not like it's republican or democrats, like they're, they're all messing up, uh. So it's it's time for everybody to just get on, get on board and do better yeah we can do good things, people. We don't just have to take the lowest common denominator, minimum viable approach. Like we can do things that are thoughtful and strategic and that can solve some of these problems in a creative way, if, if people are willing to do the work. I think yeah, amen.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 35:12

Amen. That said, let's talk about a business that's doing something pretty innovative.

Ben Larson: 35:18

Business, not politics. I think that that's a way to keep things a little bit more lighthearted. I think that's a way to keep things a little bit more lighthearted.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 35:24

Yeah, let's do that. Have you heard of Charlotte's Web folks? I'm sure you have Early early entrance into the CBD space and the founders of Charlotte's Web, the Stanley Brothers, are turning their attention to moving THC and other psychoactive products like psilocybin through the FDA.

Ben Larson: 35:46

Wow, wow, that's huge. First credit to the Stanley brothers and everything. They are the ones who got me emotionally committed to the cannabis industry and, yeah, coming out of out of the tech sector and into cannabis. Truthfully, like transparently, I mean I started a venture fund so obviously I thought that there was a good capital opportunity for me. But pretty much immediately I started reading the stories about Charlotte Figge and I was still traveling on kind of the speaking circuit, especially across Europe and was giving talks and the stories about Charlotte and what the Stanley Brothers did it would just captivate thousands of people and just draw silence across these crowds and it was so powerful and I mean that is pretty much what ingrained in me. It's like this is what I have to do with my career versus what I can do to make money. And so, yeah, huge, huge shout out to them, but excited to see them take it to the next level. I think it's really good for the brand of cannabis and this whole conversation about cannabis is medicine.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 37:00

Yeah, and Epidiolex has passed through the FDA's approval process and is a cannabinoid based medicine, but it's not intoxicating. It's based off CBD and what these guys are doing now is actually working on pushing through a THC derived medicine and it's interesting in light of the conversation that has gotten quieter as we talked about federal reform today. We did not talk about rescheduling, but there was a lot of discussion over the past year about rescheduling and the move towards putting cannabis into Schedule 3. And while we talked a lot about the business implications of that being a elimination of 280E for cannabis operators 280E for cannabis operators the other thing that a Schedule III reclassification would do is open the door to cannabis being looked at as a medicine in a different way than it is today and of creating a comfortability for pharma companies to start looking at the space in a way that they haven't been up until now.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 37:59

And I think that this approach that the Stanley brothers are bringing THC to the FDA and looking at getting approval for a THC focused product as indicative of what I saw and what I thought would happen with schedule three is more THC and intoxicating medicines being created and commercialized in different, unique ways. So I do think that this has the potential to really disrupt cannabinoid consumption and reach new consumers that we aren't reaching now. But we've been reaching a lot of new consumers with hemp beverage and with hemp commercialization and I think cannabinoid THC medicalization through an FDA approved medicine will broaden the umbrella even more to new demographics of people that would never try cannabis for recreational purposes. So I do think it's exciting. I think we'll see what happens, how successful they are. It's not easy to get through FDA.

Ben Larson: 39:01

No, no, it's very expensive, which they have very strong backers, I'm told. So that's very, very good, yeah, and it's a huge part of this multi-pronged approach to normalization, right and, and how we think about medicine and how we think about ingredients, and if both can be true at the same time, of there being a pharmaceutical thc that is very prescribed for medicine and is backed by insurance and you can go to the grocery store and buy a beverage, that is huge for changing our perspective about what is the versatility of this plant and its ingredients?

AnnaRae Grabstein: 39:38

Yeah, the Forbes article about the Charlotte's Web team looking at THC is very focused on THC as a pathway to support autism, which is a hot topic, with RFK Juniors, hhs, talking a lot about autism. Yeah, so I think that it's possible that these guys might find that they have some allies at HHS. Certainly, autism is something that is being talked about on a larger stage yeah we'll see what happens and keep you up to date.

Ben Larson: 40:12

if we go a couple layers deeper, I I have heard um some utterances of us seeing revisiting rescheduling come the fall, so that that kind of also starts to fall in line and and look, I mean bat, one of the backers is like they've got deep pockets and they know how to lobby. This isn't happening haphazardly and I'm certain that there's a lot more happening behind the scenes that shows that this is potentially a positive signaling for the trajectory of Schedule 3.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 40:43

Yeah, I agree, and a quick, quick drop of a little bit of data that the one other cannabinoid based medicine, epidiolex, that is approved, did $972 million of sales last year and is on track to achieve $1 billion of sales this year. That one product and the families are saying that THC based autism drug that they're looking to get approved, they think could achieve far greater success than Epidiolex. So they have their eyes on the billions, not the millions, of what this product mean in the market, which is pretty substantial.

Ben Larson: 41:20

Well then, after you've been through the process once for one application, you know, we all know, thc has a multitude of applications, so you pick the pick. The next ailment and I can only imagine that the approval process is is that much smoother, um, getting through, because you don't have to worry about doing all the toxicity reporting and all that kind of stuff right, wow.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 41:44

so I think that's it for our news update, you guys? Oh my gosh, that was a lot.

Ben Larson: 41:49

That was intense. I should take vacation more often. It just kind of I don't know it's been a busy news week or things just compressed because I've been gone for a couple weeks.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 41:59

Yeah, you're looking a little red. I can tell that all this stuff is heating you up.

Ben Larson: 42:04

I also spent two weeks in the sun, because it's summer in Japan.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 42:08

Yeah Well, so I think, on the back of this emotionally filled episode where you guys all heard from Ben and I a little bit more about how we feel about some of these legislators, ben, why don't you do the last calls today and leave us with the final message for our listeners?

Ben Larson: 42:27

Last call, all right, well, I'm going to take it to something adjacent, not cannabis related, let's see. So, right before this, I had my therapy session. So it was nice to come back from my vacation, settle in and do a therapy session while things felt really great and going into it, it's like, oh, what are we going to talk about? How great our trip was and all the awesomeness that we are, and it was amazing, hey. So shout out to to matthew uh, he's an incredible couples therapist and he was able to draw tears out when we didn't even know something was under the surface. But that's not what this is about, what we.

Ben Larson: 43:09

The big takeaway is to be present in conversations and be truly present, no matter who it is your loved one, your business partner, your coworker and not only hear what the people are saying, but seeing how they're saying it and seeing what they're feeling and trying to see if the two align. And I don't think that's something that people spend enough time doing, and I think it's hyper important for business leaders cannabis business leaders alike to do that with their team. All right, you're hearing one thing, you're hearing how they're feeling, but is it congruent with their body language and their facial expressions and is there an opportunity for you to dig a little bit deeper and be a little bit more curious, and it's a lesson that my wife and I took away today. I think it's something that I pride myself in and I have that tendency to seek that out, but it's also having the courage to cross your gut and dig a little bit deeper and just promote deeper connection with whoever you're talking with.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 44:17

I love that. I think that I might want to have a little last call after your last call.

Ben Larson: 44:24

Let's do it To follow up on it. Double last call. Yeah, today's the day.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 44:28

I like how you leaned into a lesson from your relationship and took that into business. And I think that there's something that I've been thinking about also that I didn't talk about at my check-in, and that is about what happens when we fail and how we get back up in two ways. I have been doing weight training, and part of the weight training is all about figuring out where your muscles fail, like pushing you to the edge of where you literally can't lift anymore and that actually symbolizes a win because it helps you to understand what your limit is, and also like where you are trying to go next. And then also, I've talked about on the show before how my son does jujitsu, and over the weekend he did his first competition and he got his butt whooped. He lost hard and was devastated and he just failed.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 45:20

This kid that he went up against was a beast and took him down, and as a parent I was faced with oh my gosh, how do I help, help him navigate this feeling of failure? His first thought was I should. I don't want to go back to jujitsu. I thought what we do not give up. We cannot give up. We have to take these cues from failure and keep trying, because that's part of the discipline. I guess that's what my last call will be too is that failure can teach us tremendous lessons. There's been a lot of failure with hopes and dreams as it relates to legislation, market, environments, all of those things, but those failures are just helping us to understand what we need to do next and to keep getting right back up.

Ben Larson: 46:05

I love that. I love that. I had a similar feeling with Alistair this past weekend because he had a basketball tournament. So he played two games and he won the first game. So I got to be excited about that, he got to be excited about that, and then they got their butt whooped in the second game and I'm like, oh, this is good, this is character building. So it's like a little humility is healthy for a seven year old. So I hope he bounces back. I hope he gets back in the ring and pours that W for himself.

AnnaRae Grabstein: 46:30

I hope so too. We're going to process it and figure out how to understand that failure can just be fuel for the fire.

Ben Larson: 46:37

Yeah Well, man, if that isn't indicative of our journey in the cannabis industry, I don't know what is. But what do you think, folks? I am so grateful to be back. I what do you think, folks? I am so grateful to be back. I'm grateful for you. Thank you for watching, for listening, for engaging. Thank you to our teams at Virtosa and Wolfmeyer. Thank you to our producer, eric Rossetti. If you've enjoyed this episode, please drop us a review, a rating on Apple Podcasts, spotify or wherever you listen. Smash that subscribe on YouTube. Thank you, thank you, thank you, as always. That subscribe on YouTube. Thank you, thank you, thank you. As always, folks stay curious, stay informed and, most importantly, keep your spirits high Until next time. That's the show.