The billboard reportedly "unleashed a social media-fed campaign, including a petition from the advocacy group Forecast the Facts calling on Heartland's corporate backers to immediately pull their funding," and prompted Rep. James Sensenbrenner Jr. (R-Wis.) to threaten to cancel his speech at the upcoming seventh International Conference on Climate Change organized by Heartland. Sensenbrenner ultimately did speak at the conference. Within 24 hours Heartland cancelled the campaign, although its president refused to apologize for it. The advertising campaign led to the resignation of two of the Institute's 12 board members, and the resignation of almost the entire Heartland Washington D.C. office, taking the Institute's biggest project (on insurance) with it. The staff of the former Heartland insurance project founded the R Street Institute and announced they "will not promote climate change skepticism."