If Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. wants to be true to his word and “Make America Healthy Again,” he must reform the Food and Drug Administration. Dr. Vinay Prasad, whose actions thwart medical freedom, endanger the unborn, and compromise patient choice, needs to go now, not at the end of April.

Prasad is a “Bernie Sanders acolyte” who “doesn’t think patients can be trusted to make their own healthcare decisions,” as Allysia Finley put it in the Wall Street Journal. Prasad disparages the 2018 right-to-try law, which give terminal patients access to experimental treatments, calling it “terrible” and “disingenuous,” written by people who “want to weaken the FDA.”

MAHA won’t survive as a slogan alone. Behind the facade of RFK’s rhetoric is an ideological agenda at odds with key conservative values.

Prasad claims that dying patients already have access to drugs through the FDA’s expanded-use programs and blames drug companies as the “major barrier” to unapproved drugs, downplaying the government’s role in blocking patient choice.

His personal crusade against faster drug approvals has chilled medical innovation. When Prasad originally resigned in July, months into his FDA tenure, amid backlash, the market predicted a shift toward a more patient-centric “right-to-try” approach, potentially cutting the bureaucratic red tape stifling cell and gene therapies and patient access.

Prasad’s pro-abortion record is even worse. He proudly identifies as “pro-choice” and progressive, a stance fundamentally at odds with pro-life conservatism. His appointment to the FDA’s Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research overseeing drug development that affects pregnant women and unborn children is a direct threat to the culture of life.

Prasad consistently casts abortion as a medical issue rather than a moral issue. He also fiercely defended mifepristone, the abortion pill, when a Texas judge tried to suspend its FDA approval. Prasad called the court’s intervention a “dangerous precedent,” and applauded the Supreme Court for preserving access to the drug, framing the issue purely as protecting “FDA authority” and “scientific integrity.” To pro-life voters, that posture reads less like neutrality and more like a commitment to keeping the abortion drug regime insulated from challenge.

Small-government promises are colliding with Prasad’s big-government dogma. Conservatives assumed RFK Jr. and his FDA appointees would shrink regulatory excess in support of President Trump’s innovation agenda, but they have done the opposite. Prasad came in with a “stringent regulatory mindset.” Rather than trusting patients to weigh risks for themselves, he has tightened the FDA’s grip with paternalistic, ideological rules. He has sidelined MAHA’s promise and expanded oversight instead.

Prasad’s policies have often expanded the FDA’s reach in ways that could seriously harm timely access to treatments. He is imposing tougher requirements on industry, insisting on larger trials and refusing to rely on surrogate endpoints for approvals, which means more delays and more red tape before new solutions can reach the public.

RELATED: MAHA allies rage over Trump’s support for controversial weed-killing chemical

Photo by JOSH EDELSON/AFP via Getty Images

The internal dynamics under Prasad reflect a top-down, bureaucratic rigidity and are under formal investigation, with the FDA retaining an outside investigator to examine workplace complaints alleging a toxic environment. Instead of signaling healthy reform, Prasad’s authoritarian rule of CBER is run on control and fear of pushback, where staff worry that dissent will be punished and experienced voices are pushed out or sidelined. Rather than “draining the swamp,” this approach fortified an insider bureaucracy loyal to Prasad’s agenda.

When the FDA held a meeting on a Commissioner’s National Priority Voucher drug, the voting members were top leaders like Prasad, not the scientists who reviewed the application. Career reviewers were excluded from the vote entirely, a major break from the FDA’s long-standing practice of empowering these staffers to make the final scientific call in order to shield approvals from political pressure.

The paradox for conservatives is obvious. Kennedy and Prasad earn plaudits for pulling back certain excesses, including scaling down aggressive vaccine promotion. Yet at the same time, they are building a larger, more controlling FDA bureaucracy in other domains — one that constricts medical freedom, slows innovation, and keeps pro-life concerns at arm’s length.

MAHA won’t survive as a slogan alone. Behind the facade of RFK’s rhetoric is an ideological agenda at odds with key conservative values. Conservatives who cherish medical freedom and rapid innovation find themselves at odds with Prasad’s FDA. A few welcome policy tweaks cannot obscure the reality of an expanding bureaucracy and pro-abortion policies.

With the 2026 midterms fast approaching, continuing this pattern will hurt Republicans and erode the trust of voters, handing Democrats an easy narrative about broken promises. Such an outcome would leave MAHA dead and MAGA mortally wounded. We must do better.

​Opinion & analysis, Hhs, Robert f. kennedy jr., Rfk jr, Vinay prasad, Food and drug administration, Fda, Big pharma, Big government, Wall street journal, Bureaucracy, Regulation, Red tape, Pro-life, Abortion, Progressives, Resignation, Make america healthy again, Maha, Vaccines, Science 

Defending Education has launched a protest tracker of K-12 student walkouts, Blaze News has learned. The national grassroots organization released the tracker amid a surge of student protests against immigration enforcement efforts.

Defending Education estimated that the number of school protests has significantly increased since 2022. The organization gathered this information from social media posts, news articles, and press releases.

‘By allowing these protests, school leaders are increasing the chance of harm befalling students and decreasing much-needed instructional time in the classroom.’

The K-12 Student Walkout and Protest Tracker estimated 21 demonstrations in 2022, 10 in 2023, 13 in 2024, and 43 in 2025. So far, in 2026, Defending Education calculated that there have been 269 protests at U.S. schools.

Walkouts were recorded in 48 states and the District of Columbia and involved approximately 421 schools, including 33 middle schools.

“The total listed is on the low end of the overall number of schools that had student walkouts/protests due to many news articles not listing names of specific schools that participated,” Defending Education noted.

A number of the total protests, 74, were organized or assisted by activist clubs or nonprofits.

RELATED: Defending Education gives parents tools to fight leftist indoctrination

Photo by John Moore/Getty Images

Defending Education’s tracker provided a list of those protests by state and district, noting in each instance the cause behind the walkouts.

The reasons for the demonstrations included disapproval of Immigration and Customs Enforcement actions and President Donald Trump, as well as support for the LGBT community and Palestine. Students organized marches to raise awareness about climate change, for school funding, and to call for stricter gun laws.

RELATED: Brawl breaks out when police chief in street clothes tries to arrest HS girl protesting ICE. Now some want chief to resign.

Photo by JEFF PACHOUD/AFP via Getty Images

Defending Education noted that its current list is not comprehensive and will be updated as the organization receives additional information.

“This data shows a multiyear trend of student walkouts for the latest far-left political cause. By allowing these protests, school leaders are increasing the chance of harm befalling students and decreasing much-needed instructional time in the classroom. Administrators need to put an end to these acts of ‘civil disobedience’ before they lose complete control,” Rhyen Staley, the research director at Defending Education, stated.

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​News, Education, Defending education, K-12 schools, K-12 education, Student protests, Student protest, Anti-ice, Anti-trump, Lgbt, Immigration and customs enforcement, Ice, Immigration, Politics 

“I’ve dealt with a lot when it comes to the LGBTQIA+ two-spirit, whatever the hell else you want to add in there, community. … But sometimes I watch a clip of this gang, and it shocks even me,” BlazeTV host Sara Gonzales says.

The clip Sara is referring to allegedly captures an incident from February at the California Democratic Party convention in San Francisco. The video went viral on social media earlier this month after journalist Andy Ngo published a detailed report.

In the clip, parental rights activist Beth Bourne questions a woman, who is reportedly the mother of a trans-identifying child, about medical interventions for minors. After a brief exchange where Bourne pressed the woman on topics like profits from gender-affirming surgeries on children and grotesque surgical procedures, the woman allegedly leaned in and whispered a death threat, “I’m gonna hunt you down and f**king kill you,” before walking away.

On this episode of “Sara Gonzales Unfiltered,” Sara is joined by Bourne as she shares why she’s fighting the trans movement.

Bourne, who serves as the Yolo County chapter chairwoman of Moms for Liberty, says she’s motivated to fight against the trans movement regardless of the dangers because the gender ideology that fuels it has personally impacted her life.

“My daughter and my family, we were very much harmed by this ideology and this belief system in our public schools, and I didn’t realize what the teachers and counselors were saying to my daughter or what she was learning at school,” she tells Sara.

When her daughter came out as trans when she was still a minor, “her pediatricians here in Davis wanted to immediately medicalize her,” she explains.

Bourne was able to stop any gender transition procedures, and today, she reports, her daughter is “healthy and whole.”

“I have all the receipts; I have the medical records; I have the curriculum from the schools. And so I just realized I couldn’t live with myself if I didn’t do everything I could to end this because I have so many friends, and I’ve met so many parents and young people, detransitioners, that have been harmed by this,” she says.

Bourne has gone to great lengths to expose the trans movement as deeply harmful — even going so far as pretending to be nonbinary.

“It was so easy,” Bourne says of her charade.

“Within 45 minutes after me declaring my nonbinary gender identity, they had me meeting with a primary care physician to get on testosterone. That took eight minutes. They changed my medical records that day to change my pronouns and my gender,” she recounts.

In a matter of a few months, Bourne was approved for a simultaneous double mastectomy and phalloplasty.

“No matter what I said to them about having mental illness in my family or been sexually assaulted … or having anorexia or eating disorders — you know, common things that young women have experienced, or in my case, older women — they were still so happy to give me the surgery,” she says.

“And they rushed [the surgeries],” she adds.

To hear more of the conversation and see wild footage of Beth Bourne apparently being threatened, watch the video above.

Want more from Sara Gonzales?

To enjoy more of Sara’s no-holds-barred takes on news and culture, subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.

​Sara gonzales, Sara gonzales unfiltered, Blazetv, Blaze media, Beth borne, Madeline mann, Trans movement, Trans violence, Trans surgeries for minors 

A counter-protester lit what police said was an explosive device during a protest Saturday against Mayor Zohran Mamdani in New York City. The counter-protester also was caught on video uttering “Allahu Akbar” as police were arresting him.

New York City Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch on Sunday announced that the device was real — not a hoax device or smoke bomb, WNYW reported.

‘Based on preliminary examination and X-ray imaging, the devices, which were a bit smaller than a football, appear to be a jar wrapped in black tape, importantly, with nuts, bolts, and screws along with a hobby fuse that could be lit.’

“It is, in fact, an improvised explosive device that could have caused serious injury or death,” Tisch said on X.

A second deployed device was still being analyzed Sunday.

The initial protest, called “Stop the Islamic Takeover of New York City,” was led by Jake Lang; police called Lang a “far-right provocateur.” The protest outside Gracie Mansion — the mayor’s residence — drew a counter-protest dubbed “Run The Nazis Out Of NYC.”

Fistfights erupted between the two sides, the New York Times reported.

Tisch stated during a press conference following the altercation that counter-protester Emir Balat, 18, “lit and threw an ignited device.”

“Witnesses reported seeing flames and smoke as it traveled through the air before it struck a barrier and extinguished itself a few feet from police officers,” Tisch said.

RELATED: Mamdani walks back popular progressive campaign promise to pedestrians

One of the devices deployed at Saturday’s dueling protests in New York City. Photo by CHARLY TRIBALLEAU / AFP via Getty Images

Balat then ran to retrieve a similar device from another man — identified as 19-year-old Ibrahim Kayumi — lit the device, ran toward the protest, and dropped it, WNYW-TV reported.

Balat and Kayumi were arrested at the scene Saturday and were in custody in connection with the devices, police told the station. It isn’t clear if the device that was determined to be an explosive was the one that was thrown or the one that was dropped.

“Based on preliminary examination and X-ray imaging, the devices, which were a bit smaller than a football, appear to be a jar wrapped in black tape, importantly, with nuts, bolts, and screws along with a hobby fuse that could be lit,” Tisch added.

A video circulated online showed a male hurling one of the devices reportedly into the crowd of anti-Mamdani protesters. A separate clip showed NYPD officers arresting the same male, who repeatedly uttered “Allahu Akbar.”

RELATED: Austin’s ‘Property of Allah’ shooter is immigration failure made flesh

Photo by CHARLY TRIBALLEAU / AFP via Getty Images

No explosions or injuries were reported.

Lang described the incident as a direct threat to his life: “Americans Christians WILL NOT be intimidated by ISLAMIC TERROR ATTACKS!!!. Last night after the attempted assassination on my life with a F**KING NAILBOMB in NYC.”

However, Mamdani’s press secretary Joe Calvello had a different take in a statement to WNYW in an earlier story: “The ‘Crusade Against Islamification’ gathering held outside Gracie Mansion today by Jake Lang, a vile white supremacist, was despicable and Islamaphobic.”

On Sunday, Mamdani released a statement also condemning Lang as a “white supremacist” and claiming his protest was “rooted in bigotry and racism.”

“Such hate has no place in New York City. It is an affront to our city’s values and the unity that defines who we are,” Mamdani also wrote.

While the mayor condemned the use of an explosive device, he did not acknowledge that police said it was carried out by a counter-protester. Not to mention that the suspect repeatedly uttered “Allahu Akbar” during his arrest.

“What followed was even more disturbing. Violence at a protest is never acceptable. The attempt to use an explosive device and hurt others is not only criminal, it is reprehensible and the antithesis of who we are,” Mamdani said of the deployment of the explosive device.

Article III Project’s Mike Davis slammed Mamdani for failing to “condemn” the “Islamists” police arrested.

“Has your wife praised the terrorists yet? Are you sad the bombs didn’t detonate? Resign,” Davis stated.

“The Trump Justice Department must bring federal terrorism and related charges. There is no chance justice will get delivered by the Islamic Caliphate of New York,” Davis added.

Journalist Nick Sortor in a social media post reacted as follows: “In Mamdani’s New York City, Islamists throwing BOMBS at Pro-Christian protestors while screaming ‘ALLAHU AKHBAR’ is apparently NOT considered terrorism. 9/11 was forgotten awfully quickly.”

Former New York City Mayor Eric Adams (D) blamed the violence on “a serious radicalization problem on both the far left and the far right.”

“No one should be surprised,” Adams wrote in a post on social media. “After years of hateful rhetoric and incitement, attempts to justify attacks on Jews in Israel, praise for violence like the killing of a CEO, and chants about ‘globalizing the intifada’ and ‘Death to America,’ words have now escalated into violence on the streets of New York City, with explosives being thrown.”

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​News, Jake lang, New york city, Nyc, New york, Islam, Pro-islam, Pro-muslim, Muslim, Zohran mamdani, Protest, Counter-protesters, Gracie mansion, Jessica tisch, Crime, Politics, Explosive device, Allahu akbar