But with legalization pressures mounting last summer, the California Beer and Beverage Distributors came out of the closet and donated $10,000 to Public Safety First, an organization fighting against California’s Prop 19. In a CNN interview about the donation, Mason Tvert, executive director of SAFER (a Colorado-based pro-pot advocacy group), said: “Every objective study on marijuana has concluded that it’s a far safer substance than alcohol. Clearly what we’re seeing here is that the alcohol industry is trying to prevent competition. They realize that marijuana is the next most popular recreational drug after alcohol and they want to insure the booze keeps flowing and the pot does not.”