Minnesota Government Psychedelics Task Force Recommends Decriminalizing Magic Mushrooms

A Minnesota task force charged with making psychedelics-related policy recommendations to lawmakers has advised that lawmakers should decriminalize the use and possession of personal-use amounts of psilocybin mushrooms—one of the latest suggestions set to go into the panel’s report to the legislature in January.

Other proposed policies recommended by the Minnesota Psychedelic Medicine Task Force so far include creating a state-regulated therapeutic psilocybin program and funding further clinical research on psilocybin and substances such as MDMA and LSD. The recommendations are purely advisory, and lawmakers would need to introduce and pass legislation to formally enact them.

Established through a bill signed into law by Gov. Tim Walz (D) in May of last year, the group is responsible for advising state lawmakers on “the legal, medical, and policy issues associated with the legalization of psychedelic medicine in the state.” It’s charged with returning a final report to the state with findings and recommendations by January 1 of next year, though the body will remain intact until mid-2025.

The task force does not make recordings of its meetings available to the public, and neither its members nor state officials have formally released vote tallies on the recommendations. Sources tell Marijuana Moment, however, that a number of recommendations have already been approved at the meetings.

Among them, the body has approved recommending that lawmakers remove all criminal penalties around use and possession of personal-use amounts of psilocybin mushrooms, though the recommendation appears silent on whether civil penalties would remain. The task force has also approved advising the creation of a state-regulated clinical psilocybin program and earmarking state money to study the therapeutic use of psilocybin, MDMA and LSD.

Those proposals all received supermajority support, according to an update sent to task force members that was obtained by Marijuana Moment. Members also declined to approve recommendations to remove criminal penalties for possessing MDMA or LSD and to allow noncommercial home cultivation and sharing of psilocybin mushrooms.

The task force also previously voted down a broader proposed recommendation that would have advised legalizing and regulating a commercial psilocybin industry.

Members of the roughly two-dozen-person panel include lawmakers and agency representatives as well as a host of others appointed by the governor with experience in health policy, mental health, substance use disorders, veterans health and psychedelic medicine.

So far the task force has not released the official vote counts on the recommendations despite multiple requests from Marijuana Moment. A representative for the Minnesota Department of Public Health, Scott Smith, last month declined to provide further details on the status of the votes, saying in an email to Marijuana Moment that “we wouldn’t want to pre-empt the minutes approval and publication process.” He added that the meeting minutes “typically come out shortly before the next, in this case, October meeting.”

According to the email to task force members, the vote count was 15–7 on decriminalizing mushrooms, 15–5 on creating a state-regulated clinical psilocybin program and 16–0 in favor of funding further psychedelics research.

September’s meeting, unlike this month’s, was captured on video and uploaded to YouTube by an account not controlled by the task force. The unofficial recording shows that members did finalize some recommendations at the time, such as the creation of a state-regulated clinical psilocybin program and the appropriation of research dollars to study the therapeutic use of psilocybin, MDMA and LSD.

As of this week, the September minutes still had not been posted to the task force’s official website, nor have vote tallies for the October meeting been published.

Reached on Thursday, Smith, the Department of Health representative, said he was checking into the matter and would respond later that day, but the department has not yet provided any additional information. Asked to confirm the recommendations that had been approved by the task force, Smith declined.

The body’s first meeting, last November, took place more than three months after it was initially scheduled. Most of that meeting consisted of housekeeping, such as selecting a chairperson and laying out the trajectory of the coming months.

Members of the roughly two-dozen-person panel consist of lawmakers and agency representatives as well as a host of others appointed by the governor with experience in health policy, mental health, substance use disorders, veterans health and psychedelic medicine.

Jessica Nielson, the body’s chair, said at the time that “I kind of straddle both worlds” in the psychedelics space, touting her “very strong understanding and deep rich experience in writing the scientific literature and interpreting it and trying to communicate that to others, while also having a lot of roots in the actual community itself.”

Rep. Nolan West (R), a task force member appointed by the House minority leader who also served on the bicameral conference committee that finalized Minnesota’s marijuana legalization law, said at the time that he was “interested in this area to try and help people through more natural means.”

A draft charter for the task force said members would be guided by three key principles: scientific rigor, collaboration and inclusivity and accountability and integrity.

Rep. Andy Smith (D), the lawmaker whose bill created the task force, has previously indicated interest in introducing legislation based on the body’s recommendation, though he has not pledged to follow the recommendations entirely.

“First and foremost, I am a representative of my constituents here in Minnesota,” he said in an interview with Marijuana Moment last year. “I have to stick to my conscience there. But the reason we went this route is because I want to be dedicated to listening to the experts on this particular issue and be as responsible as possible.”

As originally introduced as a standalone bill, Smith’s psychedelics legislation would have required the task force to look at mescaline, bufotenine, DMT, 5-MeO-DMT, 2C-B, ibogaine, salvinorin A and ketamine. But it was amended in committee to focus only on psilocybin, MDMA and LSD.

In addition to creating the psychedelics task force, the omnibus bill that the governor signed to create the Psychedelic Medicine Task Force also included provisions to establish safe drug consumption sites.

A separate Minnesota law also took effect in August of last year that legalized drug paraphernalia possession, syringe services, controlled substances residue and testing.

Meanwhile, as the state prepares to license cannabis businesses that are expected to begin selling marijuana to adult consumers next year, state regulators recently awarded social equity status to hundreds of business license applicants—part of an effort by the state to redress past drug war harms.

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Photo courtesy of Wikimedia/Mädi.