‘Do not try obtain ibogaine from online sources’: Bryan Hubbard

Added: 2026-05-05

[00:00:00]Are there any concerns that this may be taken in an environment that's not controlled? And what do you say to the concerns that this may be harmful as opposed to healing?

[00:00:13]Well, those concerns are valid.

[00:00:15]>> [clears throat] >> Ibogaine is a very serious medication.

[00:00:17]It comes with a very specific cardiac risk. If you take too much of it, it will stop your heart. This is not to be trifled with. It has no recreational or party use. And for the individual who takes it, they're going to feel terrible.

[00:00:33]If a state of semi-paralysis for 12 hours accompanied by repeated rounds of throwing up is your idea of a party, you're going to have a blast. Because that's what almost everyone experiences with an Ibogaine treatment. It is not fun.

[00:00:47]It is a treatment often of last resort.

[00:00:50]It is not first-line. It's for those for whom most other treatments have failed.

[00:00:54]It must be delivered within a clinically controlled medical setting by appropriately trained medical professionals who co-administer magnesium and keep continual cardiac monitoring in place to ensure that if the heart falls out of rhythm, a cardiac stabilizer called atropine can be administered to place it back in perfect beat. No one should try to obtain or to take Ibogaine treatment from any source online. And they need to do extremely careful research if they seek it in any of these clinics which happen to operate in South Africa and Mexico and Central America.

[00:01:30]What is the difference between Ibogaine and and other plant-based medicines?

[00:01:35]Excuse my ignorance, but there are a few out there. Can you just explain what the difference is?

[00:01:42]So, when we refer to psychedelics broadly, we're talking about those that folks mostly understand. The magic mushroom or psilocybin, LSD, MDMA, and now Ibogaine, as well as ayahuasca and mescaline. It's pretty extraordinary that we're now at this moment with the President Trump signing this executive order to fast-track more research into this. Why do you think it's taken so long to get to this point in time? Do you have any thoughts around potentially being people or companies that that wouldn't want this research to go ahead?

[00:02:13]Oh gosh, this is a question that could take its own hour to answer, but I'll I will answer it as succinctly and linearly as I can. Let's start back in the 1970 Controlled Substances Act, which outlawed all of the psychedelics in the name of law, order, and maintaining the cohesion of society. This was the weaponization of law against >> [clears throat] >> the 1960s counterculture, frankly against African-Americans and others who were deemed to be off the mainline of society, and the tool which has been used to create mass incarceration in the United States for what are for the most part non-violent drug offenses.

[00:02:50]The 1970s Controlled Substances Act initiated the drug war. Drug war is its own business enterprise that takes a lot of money, spends a lot of money, and must to continue to do so. When we look at the past 30 years of American history, we can see that power itself has been the greatest criminal. And why do I say that? The opioid epidemic is now in its 30th year in the United States. It is a premeditated and deliberately engineered humanitarian catastrophe that is the gravest that has played out in this country since the end of the Civil War. We've had the 2008 financial crisis which dispossessed millions of people from their ownership of the American dream and sent them the bill for their disposition. We have 25 years of unremitting warfare, which again have taken exponentially more service member lives here in home than have been lost on battlefield abroad.

[00:03:42]The sum total paid for the criminality of power has been 1.5 million dead Americans from alcohol-related disease, suicide, and drug overdose. A figure in 10 years that exceeds all soldiers lost in war going back to July 4, 1776 when the nation declared its independence.

[00:04:01]We have a catastrophic mental and substance use crisis in the United States that is rooted in spiritual despair at scale. Spiritual despair created by the crimes perpetrated on American society from on high.

[00:04:17]>> [clears throat] >> It is my belief that President Trump responded to a gentleman who has had the thought and the courage in the form of Mr. Rogan to ask him to consider aligning the federal government around the creation of a medication that can heal the wounds that have been caused and inflicted by the decisions of power itself. He was genuinely responsive. And now, as I sit here with you, we can say that federal prohibition of psychedelic medicine in the United States is over.

[00:04:49]And for that, no matter what one may think of President Trump, this is a tremendous humanitarian accomplishment that has the capacity, if properly [clears throat] shepherded, to improve the human condition at scale globally.

[00:05:03]It's pretty extraordinary, and I really enjoyed listening to Joe Rogan talk about his text message exchange with President Trump and just how quickly Donald Trump was willing to move on this. Can you share with us your experience from sitting down with Joe Rogan, speaking about this?

[00:05:20]And and now we're at this position where Donald Trump has signed an executive order to fast-track research.

[00:05:27]It's pretty extraordinary. Did you think we would end up here?

[00:05:31]Well, I wasn't quite sure, but I knew that we were going to have to throw a Hail Mary pass. When Governor former Texas Governor Rick Perry and I went in to sit down for our second interview on March the 31st, during the course of the interview, I expressed my opinion that it was going to take the President of the United States to direct the federal government to align with this opportunity in order to make it happen.

[00:05:55]When the headphones came off and the camera was off, I said, "Governor Perry and I said, 'We've got a favor to ask.

[00:06:02]Would you be willing to ask the President of the United States to have a meeting with me, meaning myself, you, and Marcus Luttrell to discuss his willingness to move Ibogaine through the federal government's drug development process.'" Mr. [clears throat] Rogan said that he would reach out and keep us posted. Then from April 1st through April 17th, there was just an extraordinary chain of events that led to the signing ceremony that occurred on Saturday [clears throat] at 9:00 a.m., April 18th. And it has been a monumental accomplishment, but the reality is the hard work really begins.

[00:06:39]Ironically, there's a quote attributed to President Clinton where he said that being president is a lot like walking across walking to a cemetery. There's a lot of people below you who are not listening.

[00:06:51]We have three four behemoth bureaucracies that are going to have to implement the President's orders. Those being the Food and Drug Administration, the Drug Enforcement Administration, the Veterans Administration, and the US Justice Department. Bureaucracies are not known for being responsive or necessarily obedient to the directives that they receive from the chief executive officer. So, the President's wishes are going to have to be carried out. And the President very well may need some help to ensure that that happens from both the inside and the outside.

[00:07:23]Mr. [clears throat] Rogan, myself, Governor Perry, and the rest of the psychedelic movement are ready to put our [clears throat] hands on the prospects for success, do everything we can to push it forward.

[00:07:36]It's it's very interesting. I think a huge amount of credit should go to Donald Trump, Joe Rogan, yourself, of course, and RFK Jr. for leading the MAHA movement. What I like about it is that they seem to be opening to listening to the people. I think plenty of Americans, people right around the world, have been ignored for a very long time. And I I feel like um it's actually people are actually getting listened to at the moment.

[00:08:04]What's the response been so far since Friday?

[00:08:08]It has been overwhelmingly positive and joyous.

[00:08:13]>> [clears throat] >> I think public polling reflected that there is about a critical threshold of 80/20 support for the advancement of psychedelic research broadly. And I would say communications that I have received are any indication that lines up perfectly with what public sentiment is. It's rare that you can find unity opportunities within societies that appear to be as fractured as that of the United States.

[00:08:38]But [clears throat] this is one of them.

[00:08:40]And I just hope that it can be faithfully served to achieve its highest and most intended purposes.

[00:08:47]What makes you so passionate about this?

[00:08:49]Why have you been fighting for this?

[00:08:51]Well, this starts with me and my earliest memories as a human being.

[00:08:58]My parents married when they were very young. They came up in a poor coal mining environment in Virginia. Like a lot of young people, they felt love was their ticket to escape. By the time I came along, those dreams had ended, and my first memories were of really [clears throat] of screaming and violence and chaos between my parents. I had two grade school educated coal mining grandfathers who took great interest in my life. They were men of great faith.

[00:09:27]And when I was old enough to understand language, each of them would spend as much time with me as they could. And before I would go home, they would each pull me aside, put me on their lap, and look at me and say, "Papaw," that's what I call my grandfathers, "Papaw, Papaw loves you. And Papaw prays for you every day.

[00:09:46]>> [clears throat] >> But more importantly, you must never forget this.

[00:09:49]God loves you.

[00:09:51]God has a unique and special purpose to achieve with your life. And no matter how scared you are, no matter how bad it gets, don't ever forget what Papaw is telling you. Know it, and it's going to God is going to see you through.

[00:10:05]If I had not had those beautiful men teach me that lesson all the way through my youth, if I were alive at all, it is highly likely that I would be in some dark hole wondering what someone like me, who held jobs as I have held, was going to do to come and get me out. I believe that the source, the greatest source of human affliction, is estrangement from our own individual divinity.

[00:10:31]And above all the promise that psychedelic research and medical development holds, it is the ability to recognize and to elevate the primacy of the human soul within the individual, within the community, and within the nation. And [snorts] it is the restoration of that recognition of eternal individual significance that gives life its greatest meaning and purpose at a time when we seem to be awash in a sea of despair. I am very thankful for our creator, in whose [clears throat] image I believe we are all made, and I believe that psychedelic medicine helps us come to that recognition within each of ourselves. Thank you so much for sharing that. Of course, this executive order is about fast-tracking research into psychedelics to help treat mental health disorders such as PTSD, addiction. Do you think it will be expanded? Of course, a lot of people suffer from from certain challenges. What are your thoughts around it being expanded? Well, on the arc of evolution, you know, I think that if we look at medicalization, it is really the first step to what I would describe as normalization because ultimately plant medicine is a fundamental human right in my opinion that every individual should be able to access whenever they wish, and certainly with the proper intention.

[00:11:52]They have the capacity to go beyond mere illness and the treatment of people who have conditions that impair their ability to function. It they have the capacity to optimize who we are as individual human beings, and we can go well beyond the wounds of war or substance dependency. If you or anybody in your audience goes to the Americans for Abegain.org website, they will see an array of ambassadors who have individual stories. It it's honestly very incredible to to hear about this.

[00:12:21]Before I let you go, can you share with us what Friday was like being just behind President Trump there alongside Joe Rogan, RFK Jr.? What was that moment like for you?

[00:12:34]Well, I must confess that I have had my own experiences with plant medicine.

[00:12:40]I've had a few mushroom trips, and >> [clears throat] >> it was the trip of a lifetime.

[00:12:46]>> [laughter] >> It was the trip of a lifetime. I can't believe I was standing there, and true, the best part of it for me was to be able to stand right there and look into those cameras and say that federal prohibition of psychedelic medicine in the United in America is over right beside the desk of Roosevelt, Eisenhower, Kennedy, Nixon, and Reagan.

[00:13:08]It was phenomenal, and I cannot thank Joe Rogan and the President of the United States enough for bringing this opportunity to the United States and hopefully to the rest of the human family.

[00:13:20]CEO of Americans for Ibogaine, Brian Hubbard, thank you so much for being so generous with your time and and sharing some of your personal stories. We really, really appreciate it. Thank you.

[00:13:31]Thank you, ma'am.