News Legalizing the trip: One ‘shroom advocate’s playbook

[thegreenhand]

Legalizing the trip: One ‘shroom advocate’s playbook​

Ryan Lizza
Politico
29 Jul 2022

Excerpt:

Here’s something about Washington, D.C., that even a lot of people who live here don’t know: Psychedelic mushrooms are basically legal.


Back in 2020, voters approved a ballot initiative that made growing, purchasing, and distributing mushrooms the lowest law enforcement priority for D.C. police. In Washington, you can have mushrooms delivered to your door in less than an hour without worrying about running afoul of local cops.

The Department of Veterans Affairs is now conducting clinical trials with psilocybin, the drug in psychedelic mushrooms, to treat mental health issues. And The Intercept reported this week that in a recent letter to Rep. Madeleine Dean (D-Pa.), the Biden administration revealed that the FDA is likely to approve the use of psilocybin to treat depression sometime in the next two years.

But cities and states are way ahead of the federal government. There are movements in more than two dozen states to either study, decriminalize or outright legalize mushrooms and other psychedelics. With many veterans as the face of the movement, it’s happening in blue states like California, New York and Vermont, as well as in red states like Utah, Kansas and Florida.