Call it retail therapy — with a prescription.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is facing fresh scrutiny after reports revealed her campaign quietly funneled nearly $19,000 to a high-end psychiatrist whose claim to fame includes cutting-edge — and controversial — ketamine treatments.
According to federal filings spotlighted by the New York Post, the progressive firebrand’s campaign shelled out a total of $18,725 to Boston-based shrink Brian Boyle across 2025. The payments were staggered — $11,550 in March, $2,800 in May, and $4,375 in October — all curiously labeled as “leadership training and consulting.”
Leadership training… from a ketamine specialist?
Boyle, a Harvard-trained “interventional psychiatrist,” touts his expertise in what he calls “unorthodox methods” for treating stubborn cases of depression, PTSD, and anxiety. Translation: therapies that wouldn’t exactly show up in your average HR seminar.
“I just saw the incredible power of what these treatments could do,” Boyle said on a podcast last year. “It’s a ton of fun helping patients get better.”
Fun — and lucrative.
The good doctor is affiliated with Stella, a boutique chain catering to deep-pocketed clients in Hollywood and high finance. Among its offerings: ketamine therapy — yes, the same drug often dubbed a “horse tranquilizer” — now repackaged as a trendy mental health fix for the elite.
The drug has a complicated reputation. While it’s increasingly used in controlled settings for depression and trauma, it’s also been tied to high-profile cases — including actor Matthew Perry, who reportedly received ketamine treatments in the weeks before his 2023 death.
Stella’s menu doesn’t stop there. The clinic also promotes treatments like stellate ganglion block — an anesthetic jab to the neck designed to calm the body’s fight-or-flight response. Even billionaire Bob Parsons has praised it for helping his PTSD.
“Celebrities tend to be more inclined to be on the hunt for highly effective solutions,” Boyle said in a past interview, pointing to the booming demand for cutting-edge wellness fixes.
No kidding.
AOC, for her part, has long been a cheerleader for alternative drug therapies. She’s pushed to loosen restrictions on psychedelics like psilocybin — aka magic mushrooms — arguing their potential for treating mental illness deserves serious study.
“There are certain schedule-1 drugs that are shown to offer a normal amount of promise to veterans and people with PTSD and also people struggling with depression and opioid addiction,” she said at a 2019 town hall.
She doubled down on that stance online: “From the opioid crisis to psilocybin’s potential w/ PTSD, it’s well past time we take drug use out of criminal consideration + into medical consideration.”
But critics aren’t buying the “leadership training” label attached to her campaign खर्च.
Paul Kamenar of the National Legal and Policy Center didn’t mince words: “While I can understand why AOC would spend $18,000 for a shrink whose specialties include narcissistic personality disorders, using her campaign contributions for what appears to be an expense for personal use violates federal campaign finance laws.”
He added, “Dr. Boyle has no expertise in that area… This looks like yet another example of misuse of campaign contributions.”
Ouch.
The congresswoman has previously acknowledged being in therapy, citing trauma from the January 6, 2021 Capitol riot — an event she described as “extraordinarily traumatizing.” She recounted hiding in a bathroom during the chaos in a 2021 interview.
Still, the optics here are hard to ignore: a self-styled champion of the working class tapping campaign funds for boutique mental health services favored by the one-percent crowd.
And about that ketamine?
The Drug Enforcement Administration describes it as “a dissociative anesthetic that has some hallucinogenic effects,” noting it can distort perception and create a sense of detachment from reality.
Which, depending on your perspective, might explain a lot in Washington.
