Free Republic

BOLSTERING NATIONAL SECURITY BY PRESERVING CRITICAL SUPPLY CHAINS: Today, President Donald J. Trump signed an Executive Order mobilizing the Defense Production Act to protect domestic production of elemental phosphorus and glyphosate-based herbicides — two critical inputs essential to military readiness and America’s agricultural strength, respectively. The Order finds that any interruption of supply of either of these critical materials could leave our defense industrial base and food supply vulnerable to hostile foreign actors. The Order delegates the President’s authority under the Defense Production Act to the Secretary of Agriculture to require the performance of contracts or orders related to these...

U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is going viral after saying on a podcast that he “used to snort cocaine off of toilet seats,” while discussing his decades-long recovery from addiction. Kennedy made the comments Thursday during an appearance on comedian Theo Von’s eponymous show, This Past Weekend w/Theo Von. Reflecting on more than 40 years of sobriety, Kennedy described the daily commitment he says has kept him in recovery. “We’ve been in recovery together for years,” Kennedy said, noting that he and Von first met at early-morning recovery meetings before the COVID-19...

Must-See RFK Jr. Interview Explains It All. In a Heritage Foundation forum on Monday, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. explained without saying so why leftists hate him as they do. In laying out the accomplishments of his extraordinary first year, Kennedy attributed his success on several fronts to the man who selected him. Said Kennedy, “Trump understands the uses of power better than any president in history.” For years, as Kennedy explained, he has been troubled by the inarguable deterioration in the health of Americans, children in particular. Said Kennedy, “I prayed God would put me in a place where I...

Newly revealed emails undermine Kennedy’s testimony about 2019 Samoa trip ahead of deadly measles outbreakThree members of Congress say the US health secretary, Robert F Kennedy Jr, lied during his Senate confirmation hearings in response to newly revealed emails that undermine his testimony that a trip he took to Samoa ahead of a deadly measles outbreak had “nothing to do with vaccines”.The governor of Hawaii, a medical doctor who responded to the crisis, also spoke out – saying that the disclosure of the emails by the Guardian and the Associated Press show Kennedy misled the Senate and that he should...

Lawmakers rejected huge health cuts President Donald Trump requested. Kennedy’s diverting the funds to pet projects and red states.Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has begun rerouting millions in discretionary funds to studies on autism and cut support for research on transgender people and studies on race and gender disparities. | Evan Vucci/AP Democrats counted it as a win Tuesday when President Donald Trump signed a law providing $20 billion more for the agency that is the world’s largest health research funder than Trump requested. Democrats’ victory could prove pyrrhic. Trump’s health secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., and his National...

WASHINGTON (AP) — On New Year’s Eve, Lee Zeldin did something out of character for an Environmental Protection Agency leader who has been hacking away at regulations intended to protect Americans’ air and water. He announced new restrictions on five chemicals commonly used in building materials, plastic products and adhesives, and he cheered it as a “MAHA win.”It was one of many signs of a fragile collaboration that’s been building between a Republican administration that’s traditionally supported big business and a Make America Healthy Again movement that argues corporate environmental harms are putting people’s health in danger. The unlikely pairing...

Devotees of the health secretary’s Make America Healthy Again movement say they oppose the Louisiana senator’s reelection.Bill Cassidy seemed aware of the political peril when he decided, a year ago, to challenge Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s skeptical views about vaccines.“My phone blows up with people who really follow you and there are many who trust you more than they trust their own physician,” the Louisiana Republican told Kennedy during his confirmation hearing, before reluctantly voting to make him health secretary.Now, as Cassidy seeks a third term, Kennedy’s followers haven’t forgiven the senator for grilling Kennedy at that hearing or for...

Some Costco customers are crying fowl over the big-box chain’s popular $4.99 rotisserie chickens, saying they contain preservatives in spite of the company’s claims to the contrary, according to a new lawsuit. Two California-based people say Costco “has systematically cheated” consumers “out of tens — if not hundreds — of millions of dollars” by advertising the poultry as being free of preservatives. The class-action lawsuit, filed last week in San Diego federal court, alleges that Costco makes the claim despite the fact that the rotisserie chickens contain sodium phosphate and carrageenan.

America is in the middle of the worst chronic health crisis in our nation’s history, but the Trump administration is laying the groundwork for revitalization—which is rooted in the real, nutritious food grown by our farmers and ranchers. Every five years, the U.S. Departments of Agriculture (USDA) and Health and Human Services (HHS) are required by law to jointly publish a report containing nutritional and dietary information and guidelines for the general public. This report, known as the Dietary Guidelines for Americans, is meant to provide science-based advice on what to eat and drink to promote health, reduce risk of...

For more than half a century, Americans have been urged to shy away from saturated fats, found mainly in animal products. We have been told to cook with canola oil instead of butter, select skim instead of whole milk, and to fill our plates with pasta instead of steak. Paradoxically, decades of adherence to this advice has coincided with rising levels of chronic disease. As people cut more saturated fat from their diets, the nation grew heavier and sicker — not healthier. Put plainly, the war on saturated fat, rooted in the hypothesis that it causes heart disease, has never...

Eastern medicine is a system that has been used for thousands of years to prevent, diagnose, and treat disease. In general, Eastern medicine entails looking at the “whole picture” of a person’s spiritual, emotional, mental, and physical health to identify what’s causing problems and then providing treatment that removes the barriers to healing and recovery. There is a trust that by treating the cause, the body will heal itself. Eastern medicine encompasses specially trained practitioners who apply acupuncture, diet, herbal therapy, meditation, physical exercise, and massage to heal patients. Proponents of Eastern medicine cite prevention, personal ownership, and patient agency...

Editor’s Note: This is an exclusive article written by former HHS official Gray Delany for Emerald Robinson’s subscribers on Substack. ====================================================================== Dr. Steven Hatfill was fired abruptly this last weekend. I am told that he was asked to resign but refused, wanting to know the specific reason for his dismissal. When he attempted to access the building the next day, he learned that his key card had been cut off. No reason for his firing has been provided — and Secretary Kennedy never called Dr. Hatfill to explain the move apparently. This is a disturbing new development for the MAHA...

A lab team in North Carolina reports that a compound formed when people consume sucralose can damage DNA. The same compound also appears in trace amounts in some store bought sucralose. The team used human cells and lab grown gut tissue to probe effects of sucralose byproducts. A new study mapped DNA damage, gut barrier changes, and gene activity. “Our new work establishes that sucralose-6-acetate is genotoxic,” says Susan Schiffman, corresponding author of the study and an adjunct professor in the joint department of biomedical engineering at North Carolina State University (NCSU) and the University of North Carolina at Chapel...

More than 420 anti-science bills attacking longstanding public health protections – vaccines, milk safety and fluoride – have been introduced in statehouses across the U.S. this year, part of an organized, politically savvy campaign to enshrine a conspiracy theory-driven agenda into law.An Associated Press investigation found that the wave of legislation has cropped up in most states, pushed by people with close ties to Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. The effort would strip away protections that have been built over a century and are integral to American lives and society. Around 30 bills have been enacted...

An impending government shutdown presents an opportunityThe U.S. government is about to run out of money. If Congress does not pass a spending bill -- or a short-term continuing resolution that keeps money flowing temporarily -- there will be a federal government shutdown this coming Tuesday. Moments like these are rare opportunities for the party that is not in control of Congress. As the New York Timesopens in a new tab or window described it, "...passing a government spending bill that can win the necessary 60 votes depends on attracting at least a small amount of Democratic support. That will...

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has officially sworn in Dr. Benjamin S. Carson, Sr., M.D. as the first National Advisor for Nutrition, Health, and Housing, an appointment that aligns with the administration’s Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) initiative. In announcing the swearing-in, USDA Secretary Brooke L. Rollins stated, “There is no one more qualified than Dr. Carson to advise on policies that improve Americans’ everyday quality of life, from nutrition to healthcare quality to ensuring families have access to safe and stable housing.”  Rollins also cited “six in ten Americans living with at least one chronic disease, and...

WATCH THE SOYLENT GREEN TRAILER In his teens, my brother had an ugly green van. Those were the days when you painted a name on them. Yep, his was Soylent Green.

On Monday, President Donald Trump presented a major announcement on the administration's plan to combat, treat, and prevent autism. The Trump Administration's Autism Action Plan pic.twitter.com/5aY5huzg8x— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) September 22, 2025Flanked by Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) Administrator Dr. Mehmet Oz, National Institute of Health (NIH) Director Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Commissioner Dr. Marty Makary, and acting Assistant Secretary of HHS Dr. Dorothy Fink, Trump thanked Kennedy for bringing this health crisis "to the forefront of American politics." He also thanked Bhattacharya,...

The agency needs to be strengthened, not torn downHis long record of fomenting distrust of vaccinesopens in a new tab or window and purveying false and misleadingopens in a new tab or window health information -- and now even stoking animusopens in a new tab or window against career scientists -- is shaping national policy. The consequences are reverberating across America's most venerable scientific institutions like the FDA and NIH. But there is no agency where the damage is so palpable and enduring than the CDC, America's frontline agency against health threats. Kennedy's campaign -- including his recent declaration that...

The most important aspect of the MAGA agenda is MAHA - Make America Healthy Again. As I wrote - here it comes, folks; first of the week - a mere decade-and-a-half ago:What's worse than debauching your finances? Debauching your human capital.No one who walks down a typical American Main Street would bet the future on the USA. Don't take it from me: stick your late grandfather in an HG Wells time-machine and fly him from 1950 to now. He would be horrified; the single most salient fact about the United States is staring you in the face. Granted, in the...