Marijuana Activist Drops Out of Race for Pa. Attorney General

Philadelphia marijuana activist “N.A. Poe” (left) with former Marine war veteran and fellow activist Mike Whiter (right) in the Capitol in Harrisburg.

Marijuana activist N.A. Poe has extinguished his campaign for Pennsylvania Attorney General.

Poe, the Libertarian candidate, announced his intention to withdraw from the race this morning. His entire effort, he said, “could be interpreted as solely an act of stoner comedy.”

“First, I would like to thank all of my supporters,” Poe said in a statement. “It is indeed a sad day when voters lose the chance to exercise their right to cast a ballot for a high school educated marijuana activist to be the top law enforcement officer in our great Commonwealth.”

As mentioned, Poe has no college or legal education. He’s a pot crusader, a comedian and a public speaker whose real name is Richard Tamaccio.

Poe has admitted that it’s obvious he’s not qualified for the position. And it doesn’t help that he was arrested by federal officers in 2013, when he sparked a joint at a civil disobedience rally outside Independence Hall and was eventually sentenced to a year of probation.

But Poe said the goal of his campaign wasn’t necessarily to win, but to bring attention to cannabis advocacy, among other things. The pot crusader trolled both the Democratic and Republican parties in the process — attorneys from both filed legal challenges seeking to remove Poe from this fall’s general election ballot on the grounds that he simply wasn’t qualified.

Poe chose to withdraw instead.

“In a country where Donald Trump is dangerously close to having the nuclear launch codes, I was pretty sure that everyone would get my point about politics in America and the flaws of our justice system,” Poe said in a statement.

This wasn’t Poe’s first time running as a Libertarian, and it might not be his last time either. In 2014, he ran in a special election for City Council at-large and secured over 4,000 votes.

“I will be running again and one day I’m not gonna be kidding,” Poe said in a statement. “I will proudly become the first public servant that openly starts his day with a double espresso and a huge doobie.”

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