State lawmakers have moved to formally add kratom and the compound 7-OH to the Sherman Law, which they said would unlock additional resources for the health department\u2019s crackdown and protect their ability to conduct that enforcement if kratom\u2019s federal legality is unclear. One such bill<\/a> will be heard by a state Senate committee later this year. The priority, according to the bill\u2019s author, Assemblymember Jasmeet Bains, a Bakersfield Democrat and a physician, is to keep kratom out of the hands of children.<\/p>\n Keep up with LAist.<\/p>\n If you’re enjoying this article, you’ll love our daily newsletter, The LA Report. Each weekday, catch up on the 5 most pressing stories to start your morning in 3 minutes or less. <\/p>\n Kratom gives a ‘floaty,’ ‘soft feeling’<\/p>\n Feel Free is earthy and aromatic, but customers don\u2019t drink it for the taste, according to the drink\u2019s manufacturer Botanic Tonics.<\/a><\/p>\n \u201cIt just made me feel a little bit floaty,\u201d said a 2024 University of Texas at Austin alumnus who requested anonymity in this story due to her public job. Botanic Tonics sponsored her university from 2022 to 2025. \u201cIt gives everything like a soft feeling.\u201d<\/p>\n Shortly after its founding, Botanic Tonics partnered with universities through athletic department sponsorships that required marketing Feel Free as medicinal. This included Florida State University, University of Texas at Austin, and USC. Botanic Tonics did not respond to multiple inquiries from CalMatters on whether they sought a college student consumer base.<\/p>\n Kratom leaves, which are plucked from coffee trees in Southeast Asia, are used and branded as alternatives to alcohol and to lessen symptoms of withdrawal from other substances like opioids. A small amount of kratom typically makes people feel alert and energetic. But high doses can produce opioid-like effects like nausea, itching, dry mouth, drowsiness, insomnia, or even psychosis, according to the Drug Enforcement Administration.<\/a><\/p>\n It can also lead to serious adverse effects like liver toxicity, seizures and addiction, according to the Food and Drug Administration,<\/a> which has not approved the plant as a lawful dietary supplement or drug. The 7-OH compound, whose effects can be reversed with Narcan, is less prevalent than mitragynine in kratom, but binds much more strongly to opioid receptors and can cause fatal overdoses.<\/a><\/p>\n Thousands of Reddit users on the subreddits r\/Quittingfeelfree and r\/Quittingkratom report physical and emotional effects, as well as severe withdrawal symptoms from the product itself. Botanic Tonics states on its website<\/a> that people with histories of substance abuse should not drink Feel Free, adding it can be \u201chabit-forming and harmful\u201d if used improperly.<\/p>\n California\u2019s Alcoholic Beverage Control department<\/a> said in January it will enforce the health department\u2019s prohibition, ordering stores with liquor licenses to remove kratom from their shelves. Cities have enacted their own bans<\/a> and limitations, including Anaheim, Oceanside, Jurupa Valley, Newport Beach and San Diego, along with the counties of Los Angeles and Riverside. Botanic Tonics still lists on its website<\/a> locations throughout California where the products can be purchased.<\/p>\n A screenshot from a Feel Free webpage that shows a store locator map with multiple pins marking locations around Sacramento where the product is available.<\/p>\n Kava root, which<\/a> can ease anxiety and insomnia, does not contain opioid-like alkaloids and is regulated<\/a> by the FDA; some people have reported liver toxicity and skin ailments after consuming it.<\/p>\n Feel Free was founded in 2020 with headquarters in Santa Monica and in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma. Within a few years, the Texas student said, the product was part of the college atmosphere, especially at parties, where she would see students chug multiple servings at once, leaving waves of empty blue bottles rolling around the floor.<\/p>\n The 2-ounce tonics, about $10 each, could be bought in any gas station, bodega or convenience store in Texas, and she saw many students drinking them on and off campus. \u201cIt would mess people up. People would use it to pregame,\u201d she said. \u201cWhenever people used it, they would shoot the entire thing.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWe were introduced to them as\u2026 a potential partner at the university,\u201d the Texas student said. \u201cSo I trusted it. That\u2019s the thing. I never thought twice about it.\u201d<\/p>\n Trojans try new product<\/p>\n The USC Trojans had a turbulent relationship with Botanic Tonics, according to Jose Eskenazi, former associate athletic director who was laid off due to budget cuts in August 2025 after 22 years on the job. He said that around the time of Feel Free\u2019s founding, PlayFly Sports, USC\u2019s sports marketing partner, approached him with a sponsorship contract. Eskenazi remembered the advertising materials he reviewed seemed innocuous, and that the product was described as \u201ccalming.\u201d So he signed a three-year contract.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was just a different category of business that we had never been involved in,\u201d he said. \u201cIt all seemed legitimate.\u201d The product was already being sold in the area at the time, at health food stores and USC Village, the nearby shopping mall where students hang out, he added.<\/p>\n \u201cIn retrospect, I mean, could we have dug a little deeper? Maybe,\u201d Eskenazi said. \u201cBut from what I recall, the research that was done, there was nothing negative that came up at the time.<\/p>\n \u201cI think they probably could have done a better job explaining what their product is,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n To fulfill their role in the partnership, the Trojans agreed to display digital rotating signage in sports stadiums, promote Feel Free on social media, and advertise the product on football game radio broadcasts.<\/p>\n A promotional Facebook post from 2022 advertises a giveaway for two USC basketball game tickets alongside a bottle of Feel Free tonic. The product is described as the \u201cOfficial tonic of USC Athletics.\u201d<\/p>\n (<\/p>\n Screenshot via the Feel Free Tonics Facebook page<\/p>\n )<\/p>\n Another requisite, Eskenazi said, was giving out free samples of the product. The Trojans\u2019 corporate partners would set up booths at the annual Fan Fest, including Botanic Tonics, which gave out samples, he said.<\/p>\n Things went south a few years into the partnership, Eskenazi said. USC officials would not comment on why the partnership ended, but Eskenazi said people complained to the university that though the drink was marketed to addicts in sobriety, people were using it to get high.<\/p>\n In response, the college administration asked the athletic department to end the sponsorship, so the department terminated the contract after about 1.5 years, Eskenazi said.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve never really had a situation like that before, where we cancelled the sponsorship based on some feedback that we had gotten,\u201d Eskenazi said. \u201cIt wasn\u2019t the right brand to align with our brand, based on the complaints that occurred.\u201d<\/p>\n David Wright, the vice president of USC Administration since 2019, deferred CalMatters inquiries about the sponsorship to the USC media relations director, who deferred the inquiries to Cody Worsham, USC athletics media relations director. Worsham told CalMatters that they reached out to \u201cprevious\u201d USC and athletics leaders and received no response.<\/p>\n CalMatters attempted to contact USC athletes from 2021 and 2022, who did not respond to questions about the Feel Free sponsorship.<\/p>\n USC, a private university, is not beholden to California public record laws. The Florida and Texas universities, both public, released their sponsorship contracts with Botanic Tonics through public record requests.<\/p>\n The contracts required the universities to make Feel Free their \u201cofficial tonic,\u201d and refuse any other partnerships with medicinal tonics \u201ctaken to give a feeling of vigor or well-being.\u201d<\/p>\n Florida State<\/a> and the University of Texas at Austin<\/a> agreed to market Feel Free through social media campaigns, arena-level LED signage, intercom announcements and \u201con-court promotion.\u201d Florida\u2019s agreement required the university to distribute samples of the drink to students, including at games and at the block parties<\/a> held beforehand, and the company gained the right to use the college\u2019s name and logo in their advertising. Texas gave Botanic Tonics the right to distribute free samples at college games and events.<\/p>\n The Texas contract expired in June 2025. Florida State terminated the contract in early 2024, the university\u2019s deputy athletics director, Douglas Walker, told CalMatters, without stating why.<\/p>\n Kratom is legal for those ages 18 and up in Texas<\/a> and 21 and older in Florida.<\/a> Laws passed in 2023 in both states require kratom product labels to have use directions and serving sizes; Florida<\/a> also banned selling kratom products that claim to be medicinal. In 2025, Texas<\/a> and Florida<\/a> legislators proposed bills to set higher standards for kratom product testing and further regulate its distribution, but the bills have not progressed.<\/p>\n Wellness emphasis<\/p>\n The Texas student worked at a health food store near campus while she attended college. The store sought to appeal to health-conscious people like university athletes and students, and specialized in products that were clean and natural. Her managers told her to market Feel Free to customers as an energizing alcohol alternative that could help with mental clarity and studying.<\/p>\n Since she was paid on commission, the student said, she recommended the drink to hundreds of customers. The drink was natural, healthy and would offer five hours of pure energy, without cops ever having a reason to pull you over, she would say.<\/p>\n \u201c\u2018Makes you feel good. Go on for it. Just take it,\u2019\u201d she said. \u201cOh yeah, they sold. They sold fast.\u201d She began to notice repeat customers.<\/p>\n Bottles of the energy drink Feel Free in Clovis on March 6, 2026.<\/p>\n (<\/p>\n Larry Valenzuela<\/p>\n \/<\/p>\n CalMatters<\/p>\n )<\/p>\n The student, her manager, and a couple of coworkers decided to try it themselves one day. She said the drink made her feel detached and she didn\u2019t like it. But her coworker, in his 20s, took to it immediately. \u201cThe effect was quick,\u201d she said. \u201cHe went from doing one maybe every other day to\u2026 buying three to four, four to five bottles at a time. And these are expensive little bottles.\u201d<\/p>\n Eventually, she said, the coworker developed a tolerance. Feel Free bottles contain two servings, but he would drink three bottles and say they had no effect. He turned to kratom supplement pills, which he would buy and consume in bulk. Witnessing the effect of the substance, she said, was like watching someone smoke too much weed. \u201cIt had altered his mood and it had altered his mental state and his behavior,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n In October 2025, a U.S. District Court judge in Northern California approved a settlement for over 40,000 plaintiffs in a class action lawsuit against Botanic Tonics, which alleged the product was sold without disclosing the health risks of kratom. According to the plaintiffs\u2019 complaint,<\/a> the company directly targeted college students because they were \u201cvulnerable\u201d and could recommend it to family and friends. The suit also alleged that Feel Free served free samples to students on the USC campus, including a study center, during finals week, telling students it would fix their stress.<\/p>\n The Texas student said she searched the product online one day, read about the side effects, and immediately stopped recommending the product after that. \u201cIt was marketed as a healthy thing, it was like a study thing. I had no idea,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s frustrating whenever you take a substance and you put it in your body and you have no idea the side effects that it could cause.\u201d<\/p>\n California legislators concerned for children<\/p>\n In February 2024, San Francisco Democratic Assemblymember Matt Haney proposed a law<\/a> to add kratom products to the Sherman Law, ban the sale of products containing kratom that is synthetic, inhalable or appealing to young people, and prohibit selling kratom to people under age 21, a restriction that Botanic Tonics adopted in May 2024.<\/a> Since it was estimated to cost over $50,000 annually to uphold, the Senate Appropriations Committee assigned the bill to the suspense file,<\/a> where it never left and ultimately failed.<\/p>\n Bains, the lawmaker from Bakersfield, introduced a bill<\/a> in February 2025 with similar kratom regulations that the Senate health committee will consider later this year. A spokesperson for Bains told CalMatters that while kratom and 7-OH are currently not legal to sell as food or drugs under California\u2019s Sherman Law, the goal of her new law is to keep it that way. Bains said she is particularly concerned about the impact of kratom on young brains, adding that kratom marketing uses bright colors and mimics candy packaging in order to appeal to young people.<\/p>\n \u201cThe neuroscience is unambiguous. The human brain continues developing into the early 20s,\u201d Bains said<\/a> at a committee hearing. \u201cExposure to substances with central nervous system effects during this critical period can interfere with proper development and increase the risk of substance use disorders later in life.\u201d<\/p>\n A California State University, San Bernardino researcher found in a 2025 study<\/a> on online kratom beverage marketing that most kratom drinks are described as either all-natural or good for well-being \u2014 and that a person would be better off consuming them, researcher and assistant economics professor Dr. Teresa Perry said. In another 2025 study<\/a>, Perry analyzed online posts about kratom and found that kratom drinkers often don\u2019t know about the side effects, because product labels don\u2019t mention them.<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s a lot of people who were taking kratom without realizing what kratom was, and who became dependent on it, who then had to figure out how to quit it on their own,\u201d Perry said.<\/p>\n Phoebe Huss is a contributor with the College Journalism Network, a collaboration between CalMatters and student journalists from across California. CalMatters higher education coverage is supported by a grant from the College Futures Foundation.<\/p>\n This article was originally published on CalMatters<\/a> and was republished under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives<\/a> license.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"California legislators are attempting to regulate products containing an addictive, opioid-like plant \u2014 one that, until recently, several…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":224027,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[102140,7,9,8,14724,102141,28837,102142,3183,3533],"class_list":["post-224026","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-california","tag-banned","tag-california","tag-california-headlines","tag-california-news","tag-college-students","tag-feel-free","tag-kratom","tag-opioid-like-product","tag-students","tag-usc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/224026","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=224026"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/224026\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/224027"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=224026"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=224026"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=224026"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/1773771191_923_.webp\")
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