Neşe Devenot is the first author and lead architect of a book-length investigative report: “The Psychedelic Syndicate: How Silicon Valley Used Veterans to Hijack the Psychedelic Industry.” The report was coauthored by colleagues at the small psychedelic harm reduction nonprofit, Psymposia. Having begun as a response to retaliation against three of the authors’ FDA testimony about MDMA-assisted therapy, the report uncovered a centralized effort by the psychedelic industry to circumvent regulatory structures and manipulate state-level policies at the state and federal levels. Drawing on research from the UCSF-JHU Opioid Industry Documents Archive (OIDA), the authors reveal how this effort has followed the same public relations playbook that contributed to the opioid crisis, including the use of industry-funded veterans and advocacy organizations as proxy groups. The report provides evidence that its authors were targeted in a coordinated campaign funded by psychedelic industry investors, and that the sole FDA advisory committee member who voted in favor of approving MDMA-assisted therapy had undisclosed ties to an industry-funded advocacy group. The authors received legal support from ProJourn, an innovative pro bono program operated by the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press. Every claim in the report was fact-checked by a team of lawyers at a university law school.

Earlier this year, Devenot previewed the report’s themes in a BBC Radio podcast, “Trip Shocked,” which aired on BBC Radio 4 on August 6. A feature article about “The Psychedelic Syndicate” was published in the Argentinian Spanish-language magazine Revista Mate, under the title “En el alma del renacimiento psicodélico hay negocios.”