Arizona's legal 'shroom boom
The law says HELL YEAH DUDE … The congresswoman who isn't ... And they do know a guy.
Next time you visit your local independent liquor store, ask for the magic mushrooms.
Chances are, they have them.
If not, try any head shop in the Valley.
About a year ago, we started hearing rumors of certain Arizona head shops carrying “magic mushroom” products.
These days, we see them everywhere.
We stopped into three liquor stores / head shops in our neighborhood this week. All three of them carried some form of magic mushroom products — either gummy or chocolate bar form.
Magic mushrooms are illegal in Arizona. (This isn’t Denver.)
But Arizona’s Libertarian leanings have always led to kind of weird drug laws.
We were the first state in the nation (tied with California) to legalize medical marijuana back in 1996. (Though thanks to the Republican Legislature’s willingness to defy the voters, it took 16 years, the passage of the Voter Protection Act and a whole separate ballot measure for Arizona to actually get its first medical marijuana dispensary up and running.)
Arizona has a law allowing you to eat peyote legally (and it’s looser than the federal law, which only allows members of Native American tribes to ingest the psychedelic cacti). There’s even a peyote church where you can pay $600 and go on a three-day “spirit walk,” provided you’re not a narc.
Recently, former U.S. Sen. Kyrsten Sinema has been on an ibogaine trip, using it herself and extolling its virtues to the state Legislature while asking for $5 million in state money to launch clinical trials of the trippy African root bark as a treatment for brain injury, neurological disorders and PTSD.1
Also, have you noticed all the ketamine therapy places popping up recently?
This year, state lawmakers funded Sinema’s ibogaine therapy research to the tune of $5 million. And in 2023, they put $5 million into researching magic mushrooms as a form of therapy.
Republican lawmakers led the charge on both fronts, which would have been an absurd prediction a decade ago.
But the magic mushrooms at your local liquor store are not marketed for therapy.
So we kept wondering two things:
Are these really “magic” mushrooms?
And, if so, how is this legal?
For the first answer, we turned to the internet.
The people of Reddit said they’re probably some mix of non-psilocybin mushrooms (those are your traditional psychedelic mushrooms, for the uninitiated) that have similar organic compounds.
Unsatisfied with that answer, we asked our local head shop employee if these are real magic mushrooms.
He was wearing a tie-dye shirt that said “good vibes” on it. So, yes, he counts as an expert.
“If you take too much, you’ll peak and then break through,” he told us. “But if you take like an eighth or two grams, you’ll get that (inhales deeply, opens eyes wide) HELL YEAH DUDE.”
He explained that many head shops pulled the mushrooms from their shelves earlier this year when Arizona started cracking down on Delta-8 and hemp-infused products. But since then, they’ve been advised that the ‘shroom products are legally murky enough to sell.
“I forgot how the guy explained it to me, but these also work in the gray area,” our local head shop employee explained.
But then he started talking about how Neanderthals ate mushrooms and their brains expanded, and that’s how humans evolved, which seemed shaky.
So we called local mycologist Gary DeSanti. He’s an arborist who first got into fungi to help his trees grow, but has gone deep down the rabbit hole of mushrooms in the 20 years since.
“I’ve bought several of (the “magic mushroom” products) just to see what they actually were,” he said. “Because I’m like, you can’t sell this stuff out in the open like that — you’re gonna get raided and thrown in jail.”
Most of the products either don’t say what’s in them, or they chalk it up to a “proprietary blend” of unnamed mushrooms. But DeSanti’s best guess is they’re using Amanita muscaria mushrooms, which are legal and can be processed in a way that removes their natural toxicity and enhances the innate psychoactive properties. And perhaps a few others like it. There are lots of types of mushrooms.
“With the ones that have Amanita, if they weren’t processed right, the biggest risk is poisoning,” he said. “And not that users are gonna die, but they could become very sick and vomit all night long, and it’d be a very miserable time.”
And people have definitely gotten sick from mystery magic mushroom products.
Last year, dozens of people across the U.S., including in Arizona, had seizures and other problems after eating Diamond Shruumz brand of mushroom chocolates and gummies. The product was recalled and investigators found some of those contained psilocin, the active ingredient in psilocybin mushrooms.
Fully warned of the consequences and still somewhat unconvinced that another mushroom could be “magic,” we purchased and cracked open a bag of gummies. The package said three gummies are a full trip, but we don’t have that kind of leisure time on our hands.
So we ate one gummy, expecting perhaps a light microdose feeling.
There was nothing micro about it.
Question 1 answered: The mushrooms are definitely magic.
If they’re not psilocybin, they’re a damn fine replica (we thought while staring at our hands).
For question 2, we turned to the Arizona Attorney General’s Office.
Earlier this year, AG Kris Mayes spearheaded an effort to clarify that Delta-8 hemp-derived products are, in fact, illegal to sell outside of a licensed medical marijuana dispensary. Those are basically gummies and drinks that include the psychoactive compound found in marijuana, but derived from hemp instead.
And thanks to confusion over a hemp provision in the federal Farm Bill, their legality was questionable. So major retailers like Bevmo were selling them without having a medical marijuana license.
Mayes told them that’s illegal.
But the magic mushroom products aren’t so clear-cut, her spokesman, Richie Taylor, told us.
Because they’re (presumably) not using psilocybin mushrooms, which are a Schedule I drug, they’re not illegal. So there’s nothing the AG’s Office can do to stop people from selling them, he said.
“Even though they may not be psilocybin or scheduled drugs, that doesn’t mean they’re safe,” he said. “They’re still a threat to public safety and people’s health because who knows what they’re taking. But from a legal standpoint, that would be a gray area.”
In fact, the proliferation of “magic mushroom” products wasn’t even on their radar until we called. (Sorry to be the narc, readers.) Nobody has complained to the criminal division, Taylor confirmed.
Taylor said it’ll be up to the state Legislature to craft laws that actually make this new breed of ‘shrooms illegal. If that happens, the AG’s Office will enforce those laws.
But drug laws have always lagged behind drug innovation. And with the speed that Americans — and especially Republicans — are shifting their views on psychedelic drugs, Arizona lawmakers seem almost as likely to legalize the real thing as outlaw the knockoff version.
In the meantime, mystery magic mushroom products are definitely proliferating, DeSanti confirmed.
But like the AG’s office, he wouldn’t recommend taking them.
“People are trying to capitalize on this psychedelic Renaissance, as they’re calling it, and unfortunately, trying to dodge around these regulations and whatnot is a little bit of a dangerous business because you don’t know what you’re buying. So I steer people clear of those types of products, just because we don’t know what’s in them,” he said.
Let! Her! In!: Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes followed through on her threats to sue the U.S. House for refusing to swear in Adelita Grijalva to her Southern Arizona congressional seat. Speaker Mike Johnson has refused the swearing-in because the House isn’t in “regular session,” but Mayes wrote in yesterday’s complaint that the delay is “to prevent (Grijalva) from signing a discharge petition that would force a vote on the release of the Epstein files and/or to strengthen his hand in the ongoing budget and appropriations negotiations.”
Faith and fever: The Colorado City area in northern Arizona is grappling with the biggest Measles outbreak Arizona has seen since 1991, the Phoenix New Times’ Morgan Fischer reports. Many of its residents are members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, including families with as many as 15 to 20 children, which presents ideal conditions for the virus to spread. The area is the former home of FLDS leader Warren Jeffs, who married 78 women — many of whom were underage — and while Jeff is currently in prison, his anti-vaccination teachings linger.
Send Bigfoot to Congress: Former Pinal County Sheriff Mark Lamb joined seven other Republicans in filing a statement of interest to replace U.S. Rep. Andy Biggs in CD5, the Arizona Mirror’s Jerod MacDonald-Evoy reports. Lamb’s complicated history involves QAnon ties, and he’s been working as a consultant since he lost the GOP primary for U.S. Senate to Kari Lake last year. Apparently, his new career also involves making AI Bigfoot videos.
If you prefer real reporting to deepfaked Sasquatch content, hit this button.
The empathy gap: A team of Republic reporters spoke with people experiencing homelessness across Phoenix, and documented stories like that of Brian Cassidy, who was unable to work after he was hit by a car and got permanent leg damage, and now stays at a medical respite center. Vecente Tsinnie was left homeless after his sober living home was shut down, and he rides the light rail to stay cool in the summer. The reporting team outlined three big hurdles in the way of meaningful reform: funding, housing and empathy.
Arpaio’s shadow: Nine Arizona law enforcement agencies are part of Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s 287(g) task force program that lets local officers enforce federal immigration law, but Maricopa County Sheriff Jerry Sheridan is hesitant to join because his department is under federal monitoring for racial profiling in the Joe Arpaio era, Rafael Carranza reports for the Arizona Luminaria and ProPublica. Sheridan does, however, support the part of the program that allows ICE activity in local jails and state prisons.
In other, other news
Arizona’s Republican legislative leaders want to appeal a federal court decision that got rid of the requirement for transgender people to undergo sexual reassignment surgery before changing their birth certificates (Caitlin Sievers / Arizona Mirror) … A woman is suing Phoenix to stop the city from auctioning off the gun used to kill her husband, who was a Phoenix police officer (Richard Ruelas / the Republic) … The Arizona Supreme Court gave Mayes an extension in the fake electors case (Wayne Schutsky / KJZZ) … Schools Superintendent Tom Horne is renewing his criticism of the Scottsdale Unified School District because a school event flier said “nonbinary youth, gender-expansive” people could attend (Tom Scanlon / Scottsdale Progress).
The boys are beefing.
Republican U.S. Rep. Juan Ciscomani and Democratic U.S. Sen. Ruben Gallego got into a tiff on Twitter after Ciscomani bashed Gallego for weighing whether to take a paycheck during the government shutdown.
Gallego suggested doing “a live town hall in (Ciscomani’s) district” to “see who’s really fighting for Arizonans.”
Earlier this year, Arizona Democrats held town halls in Ciscomani’s district to make a point about his continued public absence.
But in the end, it was the Arizona Citizens Clean Elections Commission that won the social media fight.
Everything we know about ibogaine comes from “Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail 1972,” in which author Hunter S. Thompson made up a rumor that Democratic presidential candidate Ed Muskie was addicted to ibogaine, and people took it seriously. As Thompson put it: “I never said he was (taking ibogaine), I said there was a rumor in Milwaukee that he was. Which was true, and I started the rumor in Milwaukee. If you read that carefully, I’m a very accurate journalist.”
If you don’t throw up about an hour after taking the shrooms they aren’t the real thing. Mike Johnson is a liar hiding behind a cross and preachy voice. He’s gotta let Grijalva in sooner or later. Taxation without representation. You go Kris. All congressmen in Arizona should be fighting for her. No Kings rally was a blast. We did the driving around the Capitol. (John you need more parking or the light rail). The only car we saw stopped, by several motorcycle cops, had “Charlie Kirk RIP” can’t imagine what was going on there. Cops were cool, no ICE that we could see. I’m sure there would have been more people in US cities if black and brown people weren’t afraid of getting picked up or harassed. Cutest thing ever, there was a Goth young woman, (I mean dressed and made up) pushing a little gray haired lady in a wheelchair holding an American flag. Great, clever, funny signs and costumes.