Florida House and Senate panel have approved sweeping agriculture legislation that, among other changes, would explicitly outlaw the distribution of psychedelic mushroom spores and mycelium.
Members of the House Housing, Agriculture and Tourism Subcommittee voted at a hearing Tuesday to advance a bill, HB 651, from sponsor Rep. Kaylee Tuck (R). The nearly 150-page measure would make a variety of adjustments to Florida’s agricultural laws, including around agricultural lands, utilities and wildlife management.
With respect to psychedelics mushrooms, it would make it illegal “to transport, import, sell, offer for sale, furnish, or give away spores or mycelium capable of producing mushrooms or other material which will contain a controlled substance, including psilocybin or psilocyn, during its lifecycle.”
Violating the proposed law would be a first-degree misdemeanor, carrying a maximum of one year in jail and a $1,000 fine.
A companion bill, SB 700, which contains the same mushroom provisions, has been introduced in the Senate by Sen. Keith Truenow (R). It was amended and approved unanimously last week by the Senate Appropriations Committee on Agriculture, Environment and General Government.
Prior to reporting the bill favorably on Tuesday, the House panel adopted a striking amendment that made a number of changes to the underlying bill, though the amendment did not substantively affect the provision dealing with spores and mycelium.
Psilocybin and psilocin are the two leading psychoactive compounds in psychedelic mushrooms. Although spores typically do not contain psilocybin or psilocin themselves, they eventually produce fruiting bodies—mushrooms—that do contain the psychedelic compounds.
Because the spores don’t contain any controlled substances, the federal government deems them legal.
“If the mushroom spores (or any other material) do not contain psilocybin or psilocin (or any other controlled substance or listed chemical), the material is considered not controlled,” Terrence Boos, the Drug Enforcement Administration’s (DEA) Drug and Chemical Evaluation Section chief, said in a memo last year. (Using a similar rationale, Boos has said that marijuana seeds are considered federally legal hemp because they themselves don’t contain THC.)
In Florida, a legislative report for HB 651 similarly notes that “spores do not contain any psilocybin properties themselves and therefore could be considered legal under current law.”
To prevent that, the proposal would clarify as illegal any spores or mycelium that could produce psilocybin or psilocin at any time in their development.
Members of the House panel did not mention the broad agriculture legislation’s psilocybin provisions during Tuesday’s hearing.
A legislative report for the Senate version of the bill notes that psychedelic mushrooms “became popular in the United States during the 1960s when American researchers first studied their healing properties and medical applications. Now, they are listed as a Schedule I controlled substance by the U.S. government, meaning they have no accepted medical use.”
It further says that “any material, compound, mixture, or preparation that contains the hallucinogenic substance known as Psilocybin has high potential for abuse and is not currently accepted as medical treatment in the United States.”
As for psilocybin and psylocin themselves, the substances are already illegal in Florida. Simple possession is a third-degree felony, carrying up to five years in prison and a $5,000 fine.
Separately this week, a Florida legislative panel began debate on a plan to regulate hemp-derived cannabinoid products, now a multibillion-dollar industry in the state.
A state judge earlier this month also dismissed a lawsuit from the cannabis company Trulieve against the state Republican Party over last year’s failed constitutional amendment that sought to legalize adult-use marijuana.
The company had argued that the GOP’s opposition campaign was “intentionally deceptive,” with “demonstrably false” claims that were “trying to fool Florida voters” into opposing the reform, but a the judge disagreed.
The campaign behind the failed legalization effort, Smart and Safe Florida is already gearing up for another ballot fight next year, having so far submitted just over 7,500 valid signatures of the 891,523 needed to make the 2026 ballot, according to the Florida Division of Elections.
The campaign’s 2026 iteration includes several changes that seem responsive to issues raised by critics about the 2024 version.
A recent survey from the University of North Florida found that, despite last year’s ballot proposal failing, there’s overwhelming, bipartisan voter support for the reform. It showed that 67 percent of Florida voters now back legalization, including 82 percent of Democrats, 66 percent of independents and 55 percent of Republicans.
The results conflict with another recent poll from the Florida Chamber of Commerce, a proactive opponent of legalization, that found majority support for the reform among likely voter (53 percent) but not enough to be enacted under the 60 percent requirement.
Meanwhile, Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) said in January that the latest version of the legalization initiative is in “big time trouble” with the state Supreme Court, predicting it will be blocked from going before voters next year.
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Photo courtesy of Wikimedia/Mushroom Observer.
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