Who is Steve De Angelo?

Steve De Angelo is a lifelong activist, author, educator and entrepreneur, having spent more than four decades at the forefront of the cannabis liberalisation movement. His most significant business accomplishments include co-founding one of the first six dispensaries licensed in the United States; the ArcView Group, the first devoted cannabis angel investment network; and Steep Hill Labs, which was the first cannabis testing facility.

In 2019, Steve also founded The Last Prisoner Project, which has grown into one of the movement's most successful advocacy organisations, including releasing several prisoners serving life sentences.

Author of 'The Cannabis Manifesto' and creator of the "Wellness Theory" of understanding cannabis, Steve was crucial in initiating Initiative 59, Washington DC's medical cannabis law and Prop 64, California's adult-use law. This is as well as successfully defending considerable legal endeavours by US law agencies to shutter the doors of his dispensary, Harborside.

If that was not enough, Steve also has media projects, including the starring role in 'Weed Wars', the first cannabis-oriented reality TV show, on the Discovery Channel in 2011; the Ask Steve series, and expansive appearances on many major channels, including CNN, FOX, MSNBC, CNBC, and The New York Times as well as global media appearances in London, Germany, Brazil, Italy and France'.

Steve has received many awards for his advocacy and industry accomplishments, including the High Times Lester Grinspoon Lifetime. He was named one of the most significant individuals and the "gatekeeper of the industry" in the International Business Times in 2015 and one of the seven "Most Powerful People" in the cannabis industry, according to Fortune magazine. He has also hosted a popular cannabis podcast.

Most recently, Steve received the Peter Tosh Equal Rights Award and became one of the first inductees into the Marijuana Business "Hall of Fame".

Steve's lifelong aim has been to bring cannabis reform to everyone. His role as an activist pursuing international cannabis legalisation globally and ending the criminalising of medicinal plants worldwide is far from over.