Jon Lubecky: how the psychedelic movement could fail

'When medicine becomes a movement, the people who suffer are the patients, because the patients are inherently exploited for the movement’

Jonathan Lubecky (on the right in the photo above) is a former Marine who developed PTSD in the second Iraq war, and tried to take his own life five times in the subsequent years. He took part in a MAPS’ trial of MDMA therapy for PTSD in 2014, and his symptoms abated. He is a career lobbyist in Washington, working on many campaigns unrelated to psychedelics and, in 2018, he joined MAPS as its Veterans and Government Affairs Liason. He helped to get the Crenshaw Amendment passed, which committed the Department of Defence to spend millions on psychedelic trials. He’s also worked briefly for VETS, one of the many psychedelic NGOs supporting veterans. But it’s become clear from recent social media posts that he is unhappy about the direction of the ‘psychedelic movement’, and feels it is using veterans for campaigning while confusing two aims - getting them access to psychedelic medicine as quickly as possible, and winning the ‘war on drugs’. He says the FDA and Congress feels the same. I reached out to him to hear his views, and to learn about his work in Ukraine for Actions Beyond Words and Frontline Medics.

NB: I got a lot of pushback for this interview and feel I should have done better fact-checking of Jonathan’s claims - which is my job, not his. I’ve added in some of the responses below.

Ecstatic Integration
So you took part in the Maps Phase Two trial in 2014.

Jon Lubecky
Correct and and interestingly enough, I refracted from Iraq on November 22nd 2006, and I took my first dose of MDMA on November 22nd 2014, so exactly eight years later.

EI
And it worked for you.

Jon Lubecky
It wasn't some magic thing. It took a while for all my symptoms to abate. They did a follow up at two months, and then one at 12 months. I still had a high level of depression at two months, but my PTSD symptoms had reduced considerably and I still technically had PTSD at that time. Fast forward 12 months and my PTSD had dropped below the threshold and my depression had come way down.

I was able to go work on campaigns and and get more involved in politics. I worked on a Senate campaign in South Carolina. I was the national veterans director for the Rand Paul for President campaign, and also worked on congressional races and various pieces of legislation unrelated to psychedelics or drugs, but all in relation to veterans. And I was very successful, which was fantastic. When you’re working on a presidential campaign, you hang out with media a lot. I would tell some reporters that I had been through this therapy, and a few stories came out about it. And that’s when MAPS got in contact and asked if I’d be interested in working for them. Rick actually called me up in 2018 and said, hey, you have experience with cannabis and stuff, Are you willing to to help MAPS?

EI
So this is around the time that MAPS and the PSFC [Psychedelic Science Funders Collaborative] leadership formulate a strategy, which is: we're going to bring in more big money from the left and right, and veterans will be an important part of the campaign strategy.

Jon Lubecky
Rick has been very open and publicly stated stated that. He famously says all the time it's about political science. And I think that strategy was ultimately the downfall of MDMA-assisted-therapy being approved by the FDA.

EI
Why?

Jon Lubecky
I don't know if you saw the Joe Rogan thing where he talked about how it was the insurance companies and pharma [who torpedoed the Lykos FDA bid]. No, it wasn't. I know the insurance lobbyists. I hang out with them and if there’s a cure for PTSD they’d be for it, because PTSD costs them so much money. As for Big Pharma, they’re not an issue yet. They will be in the next step, because they’re going to invest billions to lock up all the intellectual property. They’re not helping now, but they're also not hurting.

It's my belief that the reason the FDA rejected it was this was: when you make everything about a movement to end the drug war, the FDA will believe that scientists put their thumb on the scale. And whether that occurred or not at Lykos (I wasn't involved in the research, so I have no idea) the FDA believed that, and that was exploited by Psymposia with the bad conduct of certain therapists. Rick Doblin's doctoral dissertation was on how to trick the FDA into legalising drugs. And frankly, they read it.

It's my belief that the reason that the FDA rejected it was this was: when you make everything about a movement to end the drug war, the FDA will believe that scientists put their thumb on the scale.

There’s a lot of good people that just that want to do science and help people. And you know what, they show up in lab coats and they don't look like hippies and they don't make it about Burning Man and all these other things. When you make it all about that and you continually say this is a way to end the war on drugs, people are going to view it that way. Lucy Walker, who made How to Change Your Mind, one of one of the people who works for her bluntly said to me, and I've got the text messages, ‘There's a propaganda war to end the war on drugs’. And I said, ‘that's not what veterans should be used for, especially if they're not being told’.

Lubecky and Rick Doblin in 2018

EI
Besides MAPS, did you work for any of many the psychedelic NGOs that work with veterans?

Jon Lubecky
For a few months I worked with VETS

EI
And what do you think about the role of psychedelic NGOs in supporting veterans and then sometimes using them for political campaigns? Do you think sometimes those two goals are aligned and sometimes they're not totally aligned?

Jon Lubecky
Well, one of the things I find interesting is how many of these organisations, the leadership or the people who are calling the shots are not actually veterans. You have Veterans Mental Health Leadership Coalition. The person who runs it is Brett Waters, and everyone knows this [General Martin Steele is the head of it and reportedly is very involved - EI]. He's also paying himself exorbitantly from donor funds just for Reason for Hope. He's paid $250,000 a year there.

And yeah, some charities have figured out we can send people overseas to do drugs, bring them back and put them in front of Congress and the media. The thing is, none of these programmes are scalable. You know Heroic Hearts and VETS combined have sent less than 3000 veterans overseas since 2017? And if it's not being done in a regulated trial, you don't have to report negative outcomes and you only have to report the positive stories. I'm sure you saw the 60 Minutes piece with Anderson Cooper?

EI
Yeah, the Heroic Hearts retreat. I saw that one of the 9 veterans had a bad experience and extended difficulties afterwards.

Jon Lubecky
It was abhorrent, because they [Heroic Hearts] took 9 veterans and said if you want to be cured like all these other people, sign away the legal rights to whatever you say under the influence and allow Anderson Cooper to use it however he wants. And if you don't, well, you just don't get healed. Having access should never be conditioned on agreement to financial or political exploitation. And the reason they send so many Navy SEALs is because SEALs are great on Capitol Hill. When you're selecting participants and patients based on who they are and their ability to influence others or the fact that they work at the American Legion on health policy, that's a big problem.

Especially when I see a reel on Instagram or Twitter of a veteran who's obviously still under the influence [ie at a psychedelic retreat and in the afterglow, not literally tripping] and they're having them film a video for fundraising. And I will be very clear, that's not MAPS, it's not Lykos. That is very much the veteran NGOs. And this idea that 'because you're a veteran, you're a good person’ isn't true. Just serving doesn't mean you're good or bad, because military service comes from the society that it serves. So you have a whole spectrum of good and bad people. But now we're seeing vet-washing from the right and left.

You know, I was sent an e-mail from Heroic Hearts Project - they wanted me to help recruit Vietnam veterans to send them down to Mexico, and then they could use them on Capitol Hill for advocacy. That's not how this works. Especially when you're hiding negative outcomes. Here are some lines from that Heroic Hearts email:

I am trying to manifest a Vietnam War vets retreat this year. 2025 marks 50 Years since the Vietnam War ended, and Jesse said we could do it if we got the funding for it. The bigger vision is that if these vets heal, they could also join Juliana/Healing Breakthrough to testify on the Hill. I don't think we've had a Vietnam war vet who used psychedelics yet share their testimony to advocate for psychedelics, which could be very powerful. Furthermore, I have a contact who is passionate about this and wants to document it, and maybe, if everything aligns after their ceremonies, integration and healing, set up a trip to bring them back to Vietnam in peace.

The State Department recently issued a warning on people going to Peru to do these things because of the risk of death, robbery, sexual assault, and all these things. These things occur in the underground. And this is one of the things that I never understood about Psymposia - they're like, ‘these compounds are inherently dangerous, and that's why everybody should do them and there should be no rules whatsoever’. [EI: Psymposia has responded that this is a ‘nonsensical’ and incorrect characterization of their views]. For me, medicine is medicine. And not a single one of the veterans in the 60 Minutes piece ingested medicine that was tested or manufactured for consumption. If it's going to be medicine, treat it like medicine.

[Heroic Hearts responds: Participation in media-designated retreats is always voluntary and clearly communicated beforehand. It does not influence selection or eligibility. Veterans select retreats from a provided schedule, clearly marked to indicate if media presence is expected. Typically, only 1-2 out of approximately 20 annual retreats involve media. Veterans who go on retreats with media present can always opt out of being filmed or participating in interviews. All testimonials are voluntary, and veterans retain the right to withdraw their consent at any time. The videos [on their social media] are personal video diaries that participants create for themselves both before and after their experience, following two days of integration. These videos are intended for personal reflection, not as testimonials. Some veterans later choose to give Heroic Hearts Project permission to share their videos. We never ask for testimonials, and we only share content if the veteran explicitly gives us permission. Even after consenting, they always have the right to withdraw their permission at any time.]

And then the bigger issue is sending people with the highest level clearances to cartel-controlled territories to do narcotics and potentially talk about classified information.