One week ago, the MAHA world received a confusing update from lead attorney Michael Connett in the case against EPA concerning American water fluoridation.
America is lunging forward being remolded with a singular priority with everything from public health to scientific discovery riding on the momentum of new leadership:
“We are realigning the organization [HHS] with its core mission and our new priorities in reversing the chronic disease epidemic.” HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. March 27, 2025
Originally thought to be scientifically low-hanging fruit ripe for MAHA change was the outdated and verifiably harmful practice of water fluoridation. A practice countless counties and states like Florida and Utah have already ended.
The EPA itself had conducted four separate mandatory reviews of existing drinking water standards since the year 2000. Its latest in February 2024 saw the agency leave fluoride out as a candidate for revision – just as it has done for the other three reviews.
Safe and effective. Business as usual. Not a priority.
It looked to be curtains for American water fluoridation in April when the National Toxicology Report released its updated analysis of the practice and found it lowered the IQs of children.
HHS Secretary Kennedy followed with an announcement that he would instruct the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to stop recommending fluoridation in communities nationwide.
Lee Zeldin’s EPA raced out front for positive MAHA praise with a press release stating:
EPA is committing to conduct a thorough review of these findings and additional peer reviewed studies to prepare an updated health effects assessment for fluoride that will inform any potential revisions to EPA’s fluoride drinking water standard.
The EPA’s scientific review Zeldin was referring to was under something called the Safe Drinking Water Act.
What Zeldin left out of his press release (along with current social media communication) and what the EPA appears desperate for the public to not hear is that the agency has been embroiled in a citizen-led lawsuit to remove fluoride for several years –and they lost.
U.S. District Judge Edward Chen in San Francisco wrote in September 2024:
The issue before this Court is whether the Plaintiffs have established by a preponderance of the evidence that the fluoridation of drinking water at levels typical in the United States poses an unreasonable risk of injury to health of the public within the meaning of Amended TSCA. For the reasons set forth below, the Court so finds. Specifically, the Court finds that fluoridation of water at 0.7 milligrams per liter (“mg/L”) – the level presently considered “optimal” in the United States – poses an unreasonable risk of reduced IQ in children...the Court finds there is an unreasonable risk of such injury, a risk sufficient to require the EPA to engage with a regulatory response…One thing the EPA cannot do, however, in the face of this Court’s finding, is to ignore that risk.”
One key to understand the current fight concerning water fluoridation are the two federal avenues being pursued. One by the EPA, under the Safe Water Drinking Act and one which used the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA).
More to the point, reviews under the Safe Water Drinking Act that Zeldin’s EPA wants, keeps the process in-house under the longtime pro-water fluoridation EPA bureaucracy with a someday, maybe timeline.
The other, court-ordered rule-making procedure legally forces the EPA’s hand to protect those vulnerable.
Citizens used their congressionally-bestowed right under TSCA to petition the EPA to consider whether a chemical (fluoride in water) presents an ‘unreasonable risk of injury to health’ but the EPA ignored their demands and concerns, was taken to court and lost.
The Trump presidency, Kennedy installed into HHS, health regulatory agency shake-ups, and MAHA momentum seemed to have absconded the fact that a court ordered the EPA to move on ending water fluoridation for those at risk by putting focus and faith back into a someday federal response on water fluoridation.
Zeldin appears to want the ultimate decision on the science and rule-making in his court, not the people’s. Admittedly, with Kennedy’s HHS oversight, the EPA has reason now to act without delay and still may.
Massive progress and minor resistance has been enjoyed within a relatively short period with the removal of toxic ingredients like artificial dyes from our food supply.
"We now have about 35% of the American food industry that has made commitments [to eliminating artificial dyes]."
It’s the areas where resistance and counterintuitive moves away from RFK Jr’s stated mission at HHS are being seen where one can deduce that both industry influence and perhaps even old agency bureaucracy are still actively working to thwart progress.
The day before EPA’s court appeal in the fluoride litigation, RFK Jr put this post out on X under the official HHS.
At the time of this article’s posting, attorney Michael Connett gave an update in the EPA’s court appeal.
Let’s hope there is action soon. Whether it comes from court orders or the EPA’s own initiative.