Politics
U.S. Senate Committee To Hold Hearing On Benefits Of Psychedelics For Military Veterans
A U.S. Senate committee has scheduled a hearing on “alternative therapies” for military veterans, with multiple witnesses expected to discuss the therapeutic benefits of psychedelics.
The field hearing will take place outside of the Capitol, with members of the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee set to meet in Montevallo, Alabama on Friday to discuss the suicide crisis among veterans and possible mental health treatments including psychedelic medicine.
Witnesses include an official with the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), Veteran Mental Health Leadership Coalition’s Adam Marr, Compass Pathways’s Steve Levine, the University of Alabama’s Jim Wright and Spinal Cord Injury & Diving Innovation’s (SCI-DI) Brian Schiefer.
“This is a call to action. The veterans aren’t broken, it’s the system,” Marr told Marijuana Moment on Thursday. “VA does some good things but what they don’t do well is these new innovations and have approaches to bring them in.”
In written testimony to be presented to the committee, Marr said that the phrase “alternative therapies” often “carries stigma,” and so he prefers to say “emerging or breakthrough therapies, as nearly every major psychedelic—MDMA, psilocybin, DMT, LSD, ibogaine, 5-MeO-DMT, methylone—are in FDA-regulated trials.”
“Generally, these psychedelic therapies show the potential to provide rapid and robust improvements in symptoms across various mental health conditions (e.g. PTSD, depression, anxiety, substance use disorders)—when used under careful conditions with preparation, clinical oversight, and integration—and they can facilitate meaningful durable changes in behavior and functioning. They are particularly promising for patients who have not benefited from existing treatments.”
Despite “promising results, psychedelic therapies face burdensome regulatory barriers to research” and access by patients, Marr said in the testimony. He also said it is “difficult to understand” why federal officials have only dedicated “minimal” funding to support studies on the substances’ therapeutic benefits.
Most witnesses selected for the hearing have been involved, in some capacity, with psychedelics research and advocacy.
For example, Ilse Wiechers, deputy executive director at the federal Veterans Health Administration (VHA)’s Office of Mental Health, was among the authors of a 2024 report looking at research and implementation considerations for psychedelic-assisted therapy at VA.
Levine serves as chief patients officer Compass Pathways, a biotechnology research company specializing in psychedelics that helped secure a “breakthrough therapy” designation for psilocybin from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
Schiefer, a military veteran himself, has also promoted the therapeutic benefits of psychedelic medicine as part of his organization’s mission at SCI-DI to expand access to alternative therapies for veterans with serious mental and physical health conditions.
Notably, the hearing is taking place in the home state of one committee member, Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-AL), who has voiced support for cannabis industry banking access but hasn’t been especially proactive on the psychedelics reform front.
The Senate meeting comes amid broader increased attention to the issue in Congress, with members on both sides of the aisle, as well as key administration officials, advocating for reform.
For example, the head of VA recently touted his role in promoting psychedelics access for veterans with serious mental health conditions, saying he “opened that door probably wider than most ever thought” was possible.
VA Secretary Doug Collins, who raised the issue in a Cabinet meeting with President Donald Trump, said “we’re going to do it the right way,” while advancing clinical trials investigating ibogaine, MDMA and psilocybin.
Last month, the secretary also reiterated that he’s “very open” to expanding access to psychedelics therapy for veterans—emphasizing that he’s intent on finding ways to “cure” people with serious mental health conditions and not just treat their surface-level symptoms.
Collins noted that VA either internally or through private partnerships is actively conducting about a dozen clinical trials into “various different substances that we’re seeing actually really good results on,” including one based at VA Bronx Health Care that’s investigating MDMA-assisted therapy with “actually really, really good results.”
During that interview, Collins was also shown a recent clip of Navy SEAL veteran Rob O’Neill, who killed Osama Bin Laden, talking about his theory that the federal government has intentionally avoided providing access to psychedelic medicine because cures are less profitable than long-term treatments. Collins responded by saying, “I’m going to tell you right now: This secretary of veterans affairs, myself, I want to heal people.”
Meanwhile, last month a GOP-controlled House committee approved an amendment attached to a must-pass defense bill that would require a “progress report” on an ongoing psychedelic therapy pilot program for active duty military service members and veterans.
However, while Congress has been notably amenable to psychedelics research proposals in recent sessions, the House Rules Committee last week separately blocked a bipartisan amendment to a spending bill led by Rep. Morgan Luttrell (R-TX) that would have given DOD another $10 million to support clinical trials into the therapeutic potential of substances such as ibogaine and psilocybin.
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Separately, bipartisan congressional lawmakers recently met with the VA secretary to discuss pathways to provide access to psychedelic medicine as an alternative treatment option for conditions such as PTSD.
After requesting the meeting with Collins in May, Reps. Lou Correa (D-CA) and Jack Bergman (R-MI)—founding co-chairs of the Congressional Psychedelic Advancing Therapies (PATH) Caucus—said the three had a productive conversations about advancing psychedelics therapy for the veteran community.
Collins has stood out as a VA secretary who’s especially passionate about exploring the potential of substances such as ibogaine and MDMA to provide relief from serious mental health conditions, coordinating with other officials including Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the head of HHS, who said recently that his aim is to free up plant-based medicine options within 12 months.
Former U.S. House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-GA) separately said the psychedelic ibogaine represents an “astonishing breakthrough” in the nation’s current “sick care system” that’s left people with serious mental health conditions without access to promising alternative treatment options—and he intends to use his influence to advance the issue.
Separately, the House recently included an amendment to a spending bill from Correa and Bergman that would encourage VA to support research into the benefits of psychedelics in treating medical conditions commonly affecting military veterans.
The lawmakers separately introduced a bill in April to provide $30 million in funding annually to establish psychedelics-focused “centers for excellence” at VA facilities, where veterans could receive novel treatment involving substances like psilocybin, MDMA and ibogaine.
Collins, for his part, also disclosed in April that he had an “eye-opening” talk with Kennedy about the therapeutic potential of psychedelic medicine. And he said he’s open to the idea of having the government provide vouchers to cover the costs of psychedelic therapy for veterans who receive services outside of VA as Congress considers pathways for access.
Bergman has also expressed optimism about the prospects of advancing psychedelics reform under Trump, arguing that the administration’s efforts to cut spending and the federal workforce will give agencies “spines” to tackle such complex issues.
Kennedy, for his part, also said in April that he had a “wonderful experience” with LSD at 15 years old, which he took because he thought he’d be able to see dinosaurs, as portrayed in a comic book he was a fan of.
Last October, Kennedy specifically criticized FDA under the prior administration over the agency’s “suppression of psychedelics” and a laundry list of other issues that he said amounted to a “war on public health” that would end under the Trump administration.
In December, VA separately announced that it’s providing $1.5 million in funding to study the efficacy of MDMA-assisted therapy for veterans with PTSD and alcohol use disorder (AUD).
Last year, VA’s Yehuda also touted an initial study the agency funded that produced “stunning and robust results” from its first-ever clinical trial into MDMA therapy.
In January, former VA Under Secretary for Health Shereef Elnahal said that it was “very encouraging” that Trump’s pick to have Kennedy lead HHS has supported psychedelics reform. And he hoped to work with him on the issue if he stayed on for the next administration, but that didn’t pan out.
