RFK Jr. Exploring How to Ban Popular Antidepressants

Americans could soon lose access to some widely used antidepressant medications.

As Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. prepares to wean the country off mental health medications, U.S. Health Department officials explored last week whether the department had the ability to ban certain treatments within a class known as selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, better known as SSRIs, Reuters reported Friday.

That class of drugs includes Zoloft, Prozac, and Lexapro, which have been approved for public use for decades. People familiar with the conversations did not reveal to Reuters which drugs the Trump administration is in talks to restrict.

HHS spokesman Andrew Nixon denied the report, declaring in a statement that Kennedy’s department “has not had any discussions about ​banning SSRIs, and any claims suggesting otherwise are false.”

Yet the writing is on the wall. Kennedy blamed the country’s mental health crisis on medication earlier this week, announcing at a daylong mental health summit that America is suffering from a “dependency crisis driven by overmedicalization” of mental health and wellness. Kennedy also unveiled new policies that he said would rein in the prescription of the widely used drugs, though he explained that while he intends to steer America’s health institutions away from prescribing psychiatric medications, those currently on them should not stop doing so.

Kennedy has railed against the use of mental health medication for years, even going so far as to spread falsehoods that antidepressants and other medications are the real underlying reason for school shootings and mass murder (as opposed to a lack of adequate gun control).

A 2026 study published in the medical journal BMJ Mental Health found that roughly one in six U.S. adults are currently taking antidepressant medications—an uptick from previous decades. Between 2005 and 2008, just 11 percent of people above the age of 12 were using the mood stabilizers, according to CDC data.

The American Psychiatric Association lists SSRIs as the first option for depression as an evidence-based treatment.

“There are a lot of prescriptions because there are a lot of folks with illnesses that can respond to these medications,” including depression and several anxiety disorders, Dr. J. John Mann of the New York State Psychiatric Institute told Reuters. “Restricting use of these medications is not justifiable medically.”

Two press freedom groups are warning that Larry Ellison may “implement the CBS playbook” at CNN by getting rid of all the anchors President Donald Trump doesn’t like.

In a letter sent Thursday to Paramount Skydance, Freedom of the Press Foundation and Reporters Without Borders demanded to see internal documents, alleging that there was “credible concern that Paramount leadership has offered, solicited, or effectuated a corrupt exchange: more favorable coverage of the Trump administration and its allies in exchange for favorable treatment by Trump administration antitrust and media regulators.”

The groups warned that since taking over Paramount, Ellison had “wielded the company to benefit Trump and cater to his preferences,” and had promised to do the same to CNN if given the chance.

Referring to a story The Guardian reported in November, the letter said: “Ellison reportedly raised the possibility that Paramount would include CNN in the purchase, then implement the CBS playbook: transforming CNN’s programming and firing anchors and commentators Trump dislikes.”

Following the Ellison takeover of Paramount, and the installation of Bari Weiss as CBS News editor in chief, there has been a talent exodus from the network, including Anderson Cooper, longtime 60 Minutes executive producer Bill Owens, CBS News producer Mary Walsh, and CBS Evening News producer Alicia Hastey. 60 Minutes host Sharyn Alfonsi will also reportedly exit her role at the end of May after clashing with Weiss.

Trump has repeatedly railed against CNN and lashed out at its stable of journalists, claiming the network is “fake news.”

Alabama Republicans approved two redistricting bills Friday, over the objections of Democrats and protesters who shouted their disapproval in the state Capitol. 

Republican Governor Kay Ivey immediately signed into law the legislation, which would redraw the state Senate map and allow for new congressional primaries in the state if the Supreme Court lifts an injunction against drawing new congressional maps before 2030. Voters had already begun casting ballots in this year’s primaries.

Protesters filled the state Capitol on Friday, shouting their disapproval of both bills, and at one point, debate was halted in the House.

“And I know we are going to redistrict here at some point, and we are going to look at some of the census data, and you are going to look at some of the people in this room, you are going to look at me in the face, you are going to shake my hand, say everything nice, and you are going to redraw my district so I can’t come back,” Democratic state Representative Chris England, who is Black, said during the debate. He and other Democrats brought up Alabama’s legacy of segregation and voter suppression.

But Alabama Republicans weren’t deterred. “Alabama now stands ready to quickly act, should the courts issue favorable rulings in our ongoing redistricting cases,” Kay said in a statement after signing the legislation. 

The move comes on the heels of the Supreme Court’s decision last week in Louisiana v. Callais, which gutted the Voting Rights Act and spurred Republican-led states across the South to begin redistricting procedures that would dilute majority-Black districts. But Alabama Republicans’ congressional effort may run afoul of that ruling, according to the ACLU of Alabama, which said in a statement that it was planning a lawsuit.

“For several years now, the court has been consistent: Alabama violated the 14th Amendment by intentionally discriminating against Black voters in its congressional and legislative maps,” ACLU of Alabama Director JaTaune Bosby Gilchrist said. “The Callais opinion even agrees.”  

The U.S. secretary of transportation is supposed to oversee America’s transportation policy, but Sean Duffy has spent a chunk of his tenure galavanting across the country with his family.

The road trip, filmed “over the course of seven months,” was fodder for an upcoming reality television show called The Great American Road Trip, Duffy revealed Friday. The series was launched in partnership with Fox News, and is set to be released on YouTube in the lead-up to America’s 250th birthday.

But not all 50 states will get airtime. Instead, Duffy’s multimonth trip hit just eight states—most of them conservative bastions—as well as the nation’s capital: Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, Florida, Texas, Arizona, Montana, Massachusetts, and Washington, D.C.

In a promotional interview on Fox News Friday, Duffy confessed that the trek was his idea.

“I wanted to lean in to America’s 250th birthday,” Duffy said, reminding the panel that he and his wife, Rachel Campos-Duffy, met on a road trip for MTV’s Real World spinoff, Road Rules: All Stars, in 1998.

“And so over the course of seven months we just kind of found these moments where I might be able to do some work, take the kids with me, do a road trip—and our motto is, ‘To love America is to see America.’” Duffy continued, “There’s so much to see in this beautiful country.” (He later clarified on X that the series “was filmed in short, one to two day production windows—such as weekends and the kids’ spring break.”)

Campos-Duffy said the straight-to-streaming family vacation emerged out of a prompt from Donald Trump, who urged his Cabinet to find ways to celebrate America ahead of the 250th anniversary.

“We thought we were going to do it on our iPhones and just do little reels, but then we started talking about it and we were like, ‘Let’s go back to our roots! Let’s do this one for free, we’ll put it onto YouTube, we’ll let the whole country see it,’” Campos-Duffy said. “Just one more family says, ‘Load up the car and let’s go spend time together, let’s make these memories, let’s see America during her birthday year.’

“Then we said we’ll have done something wonderful,” she added.

Preempting criticism of the major outing, Campos-Duffy claimed that the rest of America is living in a “PornHub world.”

“This is really wholesome, good family stuff,” she said.

The couple urged American families to do the same, insisting that 2026 is the perfect year to explore the nation—though exactly how Americans are supposed to afford it is not clear.

The cost of oil and gas is through the roof due to the ongoing war with Iran. The average cost of gas nationwide is $4.54 per gallon, with large swaths of the country pushing $5 a gallon, according to the American Automobile Association’s price tracker. That’s about 50 percent higher than before the war started. In some areas of California, such as Mono County, fuel costs are well above $7 per gallon.

Analysts have predicted that high prices are probably here to stay at least through the end of 2026 as the war drags on. Last month, Energy Secretary Chris Wright posited that costs could climb even steeper before the midterm elections.

This article has been updated to clarify the amount of time Duffy spent filming the series.

FEMA has been deliberately delaying grants to blue states, putting American citizens and Indigenous tribal land at risk in order to carry out President Trump’s petty and vindictive agenda.

On Friday, The Washington Post reported that FEMA significantly decreased the amount of hazard-mitigation grants to Democratic-led states last year. From February to June 2025, the agency awarded $91 million per month, before reducing that to just $3 million a month for the rest of 2025. While the agency appeared to reverse course,  approving grants worth $760 million in March after facing legal scrutiny, Colorado and California have still received barely any money since last summer. 

California has only received $830,000 from FEMA since July 2025. Colorado has not received anything, according to the Post’s analysis.

Experts say this is a deliberate and targeted decision. 

“There’s a pattern—a state like Colorado is repeatedly being denied FEMA aid and others like California are waiting on FEMA money that’s already been approved,” the Carnegie Endowment’s sustainability, climate, and geopolitics research assistant Debbra Goh told the Post. “Hazard-mitigation funding is designed to help communities prepare for the next disaster. Without it, communities are rebuilding into the same risk.” 

Much of this funding delay is also due to former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem’s aggressive policy requiring that she personally sign off on any FEMA aid over $100,000.

“Communities still have damaged park facilities, fenced-off trailheads, and patched-up roadways that wash out in heavy rain because permanent work cannot move at full speed without the promised federal reimbursement,” California Governor Gavin Newsom said last month. “Schools still wait for dollars to rebuild facilities and classrooms that burned or were heavily damaged.​”

Colorado Representative Joe Neguse noted that the delays also come in the face of evolving environmental issues. 

“Climate change is a five-alarm fire—literally—for our state.… We’ve already had a number of fires, and I anticipate this year could be the most difficult fire season we’ve had in some time. And unfortunately, right now, we find ourselves at a time when the administration has no regard for the communities that it is supposed to serve,” Neguse said. “[Colorado is] entitled to the same relief that folks in Kentucky and South Carolina and other Republican states have been able to access.”

While the Trump administration claims there is “no politicization to the president’s decisions on disaster relief,” its past actions would suggest otherwise, as Trump denied disaster aid to blue states last October.