‘BILLY LOVES WILLIE’ BILLBOARD LAUNCHES IN WESTERN NORTH CAROLINA WITH A 40-DAY CALL TO ‘SAVE HEMP’

A new digital billboard went live today in Canton, North Carolina, outside Asheville, with three words: BILLY LOVES WILLIE. The launch begins a 40-day cultural campaign calling national attention to changing federal hemp policy and the people, farms, businesses and communities affected by it.

The campaign is led by Asheville-area resident Craig Rose, known nationally under his former name Craig Gross as the California pastor who founded XXXchurch and created the provocative Jesus Loves Porn Stars outreach covered by ABC News. Rose is now bringing the same conversation-first playbook to the collision of evangelical Christianity, hemp and cannabis culture in Billy Graham country.

The team is on the ground in Canton and Asheville and available immediately for interviews, original photography, video and location reporting. The campaign website also invites Franklin Graham to respond and participate in the public conversation.

A REAL CLOCK — AND A MOVING TARGET

In 2018, Congress removed qualifying hemp from federal controlled-substance law, and a national marketplace followed. Farmers planted. Companies invested. Products were developed. Consumers adopted them. In many states, hemp-derived THC drinks, gummies and other products moved into restaurants, bars, liquor stores, festivals and mainstream culture.

Congress has since enacted a narrower federal definition of hemp scheduled to take effect Nov. 12, 2026. Under that framework, many intoxicating products legally sold under today's hemp rules would no longer qualify as federal hemp in their present form.

That does not mean all hemp becomes illegal. Industrial hemp remains expressly included. CBD, fiber, grain, non-intoxicating products and other hemp products involve different facts and formulations. Federal and state laws are also separate questions.

• 01In many states, adults can buy these products today.
• 02The federal rules are set to change.
• 03The clock is running.

The clock may also move. On Aug. 8, the U.S. Senate passed legislation containing a temporary provision that would hold back most of the federal change until Dec. 11, while allowing certain exclusions involving cannabinoids that cannot be naturally produced by cannabis to proceed in November.

As of this release, that provision has not become law and still requires House approval and the president's signature. Nov. 12 therefore remains the enacted federal date.

That uncertainty is not a footnote to The Final Countdown. It is the plot. The campaign will use Dec. 11 — the date in the Senate-passed proposal — as its planned public DAY ZERO while updating the clock whenever Washington changes the facts.

“This isn't a weed rally, a trade show, a sermon or a funeral. It's a revival tent with a sound system. Congress legalized hemp, Americans built real businesses and communities around it, and now Washington is changing the rules — and possibly the date of the rule change. You could not invent a better countdown.”

“The rules may change. The plant will still grow here. So we're going to start with 'I love you,' put everyone in the same room, understand what the hell is happening and have some fun while the clock runs.”

THE FIRST CLUE: BILLY LOVES WILLIE

The Canton billboard launched September 9 and begins a public story that will unfold in chapters throughout September and October. The sentence belongs to whoever is reading it, while the campaign around it asks whether communities shaped by evangelical Christianity can embrace the people and livelihoods connected to hemp.

“Billy Loves Willie isn't a punchline. It's a possibility.”

“We are not going to settle it for you. That argument is the forty days.”

The billboard does not advertise a product or tell people what to think. It asks them to remain curious long enough for the larger conversation to begin.

ASHEVILLE BECOMES THE MOTHERSHIP

The physical campaign opens Oct. 31 along Asheville's Haywood Road corridor, with Franny's Farmacy serving as a central community partner alongside neighboring music, art and hospitality spaces.

The Final Countdown is not 40 giant events. The space itself is the event. For 40 days, it will remain alive as a listening room, classroom, gallery, cultural lounge, community table and documentary set.

• 01Farmers will tell their stories.
• 02Scientists and doctors will explain what is inside the products.
• 03Lawyers will explain the law without requiring a law degree.
• 04Founders, employees and hospitality operators will explain what regulatory changes mean for real businesses and jobs.
• 05Artists and musicians will perform.
• 06Veterans, parents, pastors, wellness leaders, regulators and people who have never touched cannabis will be invited into the same room.

Daytime programming will range from hemp and pets to farming, wellness, science, food and plant medicine. Nights will feature vinyl, listening sessions, artist releases, live performances, humor and conversation.

Any age-restricted product experience will occur only where legally permissible and under applicable venue rules. Nobody has to agree before entering. That is the point.

ONE QUESTION EVERY DAY

Each day will begin with one understandable question:

Every question will produce a public conversation and a piece of national content: an interview, performance, portrait, explainer, comedy segment or documentary dispatch. Music will be structural — not background entertainment — with a planned architecture of 40 songs, 40 artists and 40 stories.

North Carolina will serve as the campaign's first policy laboratory, with federal and state rules explained separately. Texas will be examined through verified public records and firsthand accounts as a case study in what can happen when policy changes quickly.

A nonpartisan action hub will let people examine source documents, identify their elected representatives, share their own stories and communicate in their own words.

THE FINAL COUNTDOWN — [CITY]

Asheville is the mothership, but it is not the boundary. The campaign will release a simple toolkit allowing communities anywhere to create their own chapter:

• 01One venue.
• 02One countdown.
• 03One conversation.
• 04One piece of daily content.

Local chapters can bring together musicians, artists, farmers, educators, businesses and community members while explaining their own state and local policies. Their stories will feed into the national campaign and documentary archive.

“This is built to travel. A venue in Austin, Nashville, Detroit, Denver — or a town nobody in Washington has ever visited — should be able to join tomorrow. The American law creates the clock, but the conversation belongs to everyone.”

THE ROAD TO DAY ZERO

Whatever happens politically becomes the ending.

ONE LAST ROACH

The Dec. 11 finale is titled ONE LAST ROACH. The proposed final-night gathering would feature Papa Roach frontman Jacoby Shaddix in an acoustic setting, alongside Kenny McCormick IV and others. It is an acoustic performance, not a full-band Papa Roach concert.

ONE LAST ROACH is presented by Spiritual Plants. Sponsorship conversations are open; no sponsor controls the programming.

Venue, final artists, age, ticketing and event information will be announced at StartWithILoveYou.com. A charitable campaign component involving the Asheville-area Hollow Bone Initiative is also being developed, with details to be announced separately.

Rose — who spent two decades in ministry under the name Craig Gross — previously created ASCENSION, a temporary cultural space on Abbot Kinney in Venice that combined music, artists, technology, light, sound, cannabis, spirituality and conversation. He is also known for creating Jesus Loves Porn Stars, an outreach designed to bring people from radically different worlds into the same room.

The Final Countdown carries that cultural-space model into a real moment in American history. No partisan team. No panic. No declaration that “hemp is dying.” Just a plant, a country, a moving clock and one question: WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?

“We legalized it. We built an industry. We created jobs. We put it in bars. We taxed it. Now we're not sure. That's the government, basically. And while they figure it out, we're going to party until the clock hits zero.”

ABOUT THE FINAL COUNTDOWN

The Final Countdown is a 40-day, nonpartisan cultural campaign based in Asheville, North Carolina. Through music, art, education, hospitality, humor, spirituality and community, it examines the changing federal treatment of intoxicating hemp-derived products and the people, businesses and communities affected by it.

The campaign provides public education and cultural programming, not legal advice. It is not affiliated with or endorsed by any political party. StartWithILoveYou.com

MEDIA CONTACT: Craig Rose (formerly Craig Gross) · craig@spiritualplants.com