“I’ve been in some of the most intense contact that a man—a human—can be in. I’ve been locked in cars with Snoop. I was in the back of my son’s dispensary and they were smoking every kind of weed in there… weed called Dead Body and Autopsy and all this,” says Ice-T in an exclusive interview. “I was so high that I stood up, did a 360 like I was leaving, and sat back down.”
If there’s a contradiction more compelling than this, it’s hard to find: Ice-T, the rapper who soundtracked generations of rebellion, who rose from the streets of South Central to the badge-wearing screens of “Law & Order,” doesn’t smoke weed—and yet, earlier this year, he opened one of New Jersey’s most anticipated cannabis dispensaries.
At 67, Ice-T isn’t here to perform a role. He’s not here to play into stereotypes or chase quick wins. His story with cannabis is older than legalization. It’s layered, cautious and built around a singular principle: survival.
“I just never smoked,” he explains. “I’m an orphan. I don’t have a mother, father, sisters, brothers, uncles… And I just always felt being high compromised my position in the streets.”
As a young man, Ice wasn’t repulsed by cannabis. He was immersed in it. He sold it. He moved “five-finger bags” in the post-high school years. He watched a friend get kicked out of school for dealing dollar joints. But for himself? Smoking wasn’t part of the plan.
“I felt like being drunk or high was not attractive to me. I felt like if I hit the ground for some reason, it was nobody’s job to pick me up.”
Even as the world around him swirled in smoke and bravado, Ice-T carved out his own lane. No tattoos. No drinks. No drugs. Just eyes open, always scanning.
In one defining moment, a neighborhood OG pressed him to take a hit. Ice refused. The man tried to humiliate him. “You’s a [redacted] if you don’t hit the joint,” he snapped. Ice didn’t flinch: “If I am… Then, make me hit it.” That was the end of it. From then on, nobody questioned him. “He don’t get high,” the same OG would repeat. It became the line of defense. An identity.
“Whatever you’re going to do, it always should be a choice,” he says. “Maybe in college there’s a lot of peer pressure, but there wasn’t peer pressure to do it where I grew up. You just had to stand on your stuff.”
He sees it all as performance. “If smoking cigarettes makes you look cool or drinking alcohol makes you look cool, then you got a problem… you’re doing something else to look cool.”
Still, despite his abstinence, Ice never turned his back on cannabis. He watched the industry bloom. The stigma shrink. The culture shift.
And eventually, he tried edibles. Dabbled in mushrooms. Entered the age of “chronic delay.”
“My son smokes a lot. We say weed gives you chronic delay. So what chronic delay is, if I say, ‘What’s your name?’ You say, [pauses for 3 seconds] ‘Javier.’ I go, ‘You want to go to the store?’ [Pauses for 3 seconds] You’re like… ‘Okay.’ That’s that chronic delay.”
Turns out, even when you don’t smoke, proximity counts.
“I’ve been high off weed,” he says, recalling the aftermath of another visit to his son’s dispensary. By the time he got home, he was in full-blown munchie mode. “We stopped at Dunkin’ Donuts. It was 11:30 at night. I imagine I just needed some donuts,” he shrugs. “It’s not like I don’t do weed. But it’s just never been something I’ve been into.”
Still, he’s quick to acknowledge the joy it brings others. The laughter. The relaxation. The munchies. The vibes.
“It just makes people laugh a lot and eat. That’s all it does. All of a sudden, any comedian is funny as heck. So, that’s fantastic.”
There’s no holier-than-thou attitude here. No superiority. Just perspective. A life built on vigilance that eventually found its way to nuance. And in the background, the business wheels began to turn.
“At the end of the day, I knew that it was a great business opportunity. As time went on, it became clear to me that this was a new wave—and it was something I wanted to get involved in.”
And that’s exactly where the story shifts—from past to present, from personal to professional. The man who never got high has now opened his own dispensary in Jersey City.
The Long Road To The Medicine Woman
For Ice-T, stepping into the cannabis industry wasn’t a celebrity stunt—it was a calculated move, rooted in trust and vision. He wasn’t chasing hype. He was looking for people who’d done the work.
“I knew Luke and Charis,” he says, referring to his longtime friends and now business partners, Charis and Luke Burrett. “I’ve known Charis and them for many years, from L.A. I knew them when they had a clothing line. I knew that they were running a legal cannabis dispensary in L.A. for years.”
The Burretts, founders of The Medicine Woman, had been in the cannabis game long before Ice came knocking. Back in 2015, under California’s Prop 215 framework, they launched the brand as a nonprofit delivery service, long before sleek branding and dispensary lounges became the norm.
That legacy is what Ice wanted to tap into. But what started as a mentorship conversation quickly evolved into something deeper.
“I called them and said, ‘If I have action at getting a dispensary, would you guys mentor me?’ And they said, ‘No, we’ll partner with you and we can franchise The Medicine Woman.’”
The result? The Medicine Woman Jersey City—a 10,000-square-foot facility located at 660 Tonnelle Avenue. Just north of Manhattan Avenue, along Route 1 and 9, the flagship dispensary opened its doors in March of this year.
Ice puts it bluntly: “Nowadays, with the fentanyl and all the different issues, it’s safer to go to a dispensary where it’s straight up… you know what’s happening.”
And that includes their people. The Medicine Woman Jersey City runs with a 15-person team, each one recruited locally. They’ve partnered with Hudson County Community College to provide internships and job training. And they’re collaborating with the Last Prisoner Project to support cannabis justice reform.
“One of the biggest challenges in any community is opportunity,” Charis says. “People with cannabis offenses are at a huge disadvantage when it comes to employment opportunities. We intentionally hired directly from the local community and prioritized those who had been adversely affected by unfair cannabis laws.”
And it’s not just talk. “Now that we are open,” she adds, “we will be able to include these organizations in our events and give opportunities for those affected and those who need more information about their options.”
Ice agrees. “This isn’t just about selling cannabis: it’s about creating opportunity and correcting injustice in communities that were hit hardest.”
Justice Isn’t Blind—It’s Selective. Just Ask Ice-T.
Ice-T’s entrance into the cannabis space isn’t rooted in novelty or nostalgia. It’s built on principle. He’s been watching the contradictions for decades. The hypocrisy. The politics. The damage.
“I mean, I don’t see why it’s not legal,” he says. “I’ve never heard about anybody dying from cannabis. They like to say it’s a gateway drug or this, that and the other. I don’t believe that.”
His logic is direct. No flourishes. No slogans. Just lived experience and the sense that some systems were never designed to protect everyone equally.
And for veterans, the issue cuts deeper. Ice doesn’t pretend to be a combat vet—“I just was in military training,” he clarifies—but he understands trauma. The kind that doesn’t wear a uniform.
“I mean, if I have PTSD, it just comes from living in South Central L.A. I’ve seen people get killed. The door slams and I duck. So I know what that is.”
In a country flooded with prescription solutions, he sees cannabis as a better option for people trying to cope. Something that offers peace without addiction. Still, the irony doesn’t escape him: in places where weed is now legal, people are still locked up for it.
“They should be letting people go,” he says. “If you’re in jail for weed and it’s not a violent offense… Just simple weed convictions, they should be all pardoned, yesterday.”
To him, it’s not complicated. If the federal government legalized cannabis, governors and presidents could act fast. They just haven’t.
He’s not waiting around for Washington to fix things. That’s why he’s backing projects like the Last Prisoner Project and working to build real infrastructure in Jersey—jobs, internships, access.
And when it comes to law enforcement, the subject gets tense. Ice has played a cop on TV for decades. But he’s never confused the role with reality.
“No, they don’t [love me]. That’s the thing about it. Cops are humans. Some of them are cool. Some of them are not. So you never know.”
His conclusion? Simple.
“I don’t trust anybody with a gun.”
As the system catches up, Ice keeps moving forward. With his partners. With his dispensary. With his mission. Always with the same steady lens: power, justice and survival.
Photos courtesy of The Medicine Woman
This article was originally published on Forbes on April 8, 2025. It is republished here with permission. Minor updates were made for timing and clarity.
