RFK Jr., Scientology, and the war on antidepressants

Kennedy as an ongoing financial connection to a Scientology-linked law firm suing antidepressant manufactures.

Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. on May 21, 2026. (Photo by David Berding/Getty Images)

The Trump administration has engaged in a lengthy campaign to discourage the use of antidepressants. The effort has been led by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who has spent years spreading misinformation about these types of medications. The Trump administration has specifically targeted selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs), which include medications like Prozac, Lexapro, and Zoloft.

Kennedy’s claims about antidepressants mirror those of the Church of Scientology, which has a long history of disdain for psychiatry and has targeted psychiatric medications for decades. Kennedy has an ongoing financial relationship with a law firm connected to Scientology that has pursued numerous lawsuits against antidepressant manufacturers.

At a 2023 Scientology event, the church’s current leader, David Miscavige, described psychiatry as “the greatest evil on Earth.” Scientology’s main vehicle for targeting this “evil” is a nonprofit it founded called the Citizens Commission on Human Rights (CCHR). CCHR runs a museum in Los Angeles called “Psychiatry: Industry of Death” and has produced several documentaries. Among the group’s claims are that psychiatry was responsible for the Holocaust, ethnic cleansing in Bosnia and Kosovo, 9/11, and several mass shootings.

One documentary produced by CCHR focuses on the connection between antidepressants and mass shootings in the U.S. The documentary claims that many mass shooters take antidepressants and presents this as evidence that the medications are the cause. Experts say there is no evidence linking antidepressants to mass shootings. A study from Columbia found that around 4% of mass shooters had used antidepressants in their lifetime, which is less than the proportion of all adults in the U.S. who take antidepressants. The documentary also makes the false claim that “psychiatric drugs are among the most addictive on Earth” and compares some of them to cocaine.

Kennedy pushes many of the same myths about antidepressants. During his Senate confirmation hearing, Kennedy claimed that SSRIs were harder to quit than heroin. (Experts disagree with this comparison. “Antidepressants and heroin are in different universes when it comes to addiction risk,” Keith Humphreys, an addiction expert, told NPR.) Kennedy has also repeatedly suggested that SSRIs may be linked to mass shootings. In 2025, after a shooting at a school in Minnesota, Kennedy said in an interview on Fox News, “We’re launching studies on the potential contribution of some of the SSRI drugs and some of the other psychiatric drugs that might be contributing to violence.”

In 2024, Kennedy said he wanted to create free “wellness farms” in rural areas where people “can go to get off of illegal drugs, off of opiates, but also legal drugs, other psychiatric drugs,” including SSRIs. This is similar to Narconon, a program run by Scientologists to help patients get off prescription medications they claim are addictive. Narconon facilities have faced multiple lawsuits from patients and families of patients who attempted or died by suicide after being taken off their psychiatric medication.

Kennedy’s financial stake in the anti-psychiatry movement

Kennedy’s connection to Scientology’s views on antidepressants is more than ideological — it’s financial.

In CCHR’s anti-SSRI documentary, a lawyer named R. Brent Wisner said, “There’s no question that there’s people right now who are in jail after committing violent crimes who never would have done that if they hadn’t taken these drugs. There’s no question that people right now are dead because of these drugs.”

Wisner’s law firm, Wisner Baum, has led dozens of lawsuits against the manufacturers of psychiatric medications and other psychiatric tools that Scientology has targeted. Kennedy referred clients to the firm and has a contingency fee agreement with them in which he receives a percentage of the payout if they win their cases. During his 2025 nomination process, Kennedy reported receiving over $850,000 in fees from Wisner Baum. He did not specify which cases generated those fees.

After senators criticized the arrangement, Kennedy said he would assign most of his payouts from Wisner Baum to “a non-dependent, adult family member,” rather than giving up the payments entirely. One of Kennedy’s sons, Conor Kennedy, also works at Wisner Baum as an attorney.

Kennedy’s campaign against SSRIs

Under Kennedy’s leadership, the Trump administration has launched a war on antidepressants.

On May 4, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced multiple initiatives to stop “psychiatric overprescribing” and encourage providers to deprescribe patients when appropriate. In a “Dear Colleague” letter, HHS encouraged providers to utilize “nonmedication approaches, such as family support, psychotherapy, nutrition, and physical activity.”

SSRIs, which are used to treat mental health conditions such as depression and anxiety, can be life-saving. Around one in six adults in the U.S. are on some type of antidepressant medication. SSRIs are the most common type of antidepressant.

Overprescription, which can refer to issues such as patients taking medications longer than necessary, is a concern in the medical community. But while the American Psychiatric Association (APA) said it supported research on the issues with prescribing and deprescribing, it objected to the Trump administration “framing the nation’s mental health crisis as primarily a problem of ‘overmedicalization’ or ‘overprescribing,’” stating it “oversimplifies a complex crisis.” The APA noted that many patients already “cannot access timely, comprehensive care,” and the initiative fails to account for other factors such as “barriers to psychotherapy.”

“Misrepresented evidence and spread misinformation”

The Trump administration efforts to discourage SSRI use began shortly after Trump started his second term. In a February 2025 order establishing Kennedy’s Make America Healthy Again Commission, President Trump instructed the commission to “assess the prevalence of and threat posed by the prescription” of SSRIs and other medications to children. Multiple “MAHA” reports have since promoted the idea of the “overmedicalization” of children, including the usage of SSRIs.

In July 2025, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) hosted a panel discussion about the use of SSRIs during pregnancy. The majority of the panelists promoted claims that SSRIs can lead to serious health risks for the mother and baby. Multiple groups of healthcare providers condemned claims made by the panelists, stating that “it misrepresented evidence and spread misinformation,” NPR reported.

Two members of the panel have connections to Scientology through Wisner Baum or CCHR. David Healy is a psychiatrist who has served as an expert witness for Wisner Baum in their lawsuits against antidepressant manufacturers. Another member of the panel, psychologist Roger McFillin, has posted on Substack about the “mass psychiatric drugging of America’s poorest children,” citing data from FOIA requests that was shared with him by CCHR.

“Scientology covert operative”

According to an article published by the Daily Beast, Wisner and Wisner Baum’s other partner, Michael L. Baum, are Scientologists. Popular Information could not independently verify their membership in the church, but there is evidence suggesting their involvement. Wisner is in the documentary produced by CCHR. Baum’s name appears in a stipulation of evidence from a criminal case against several prominent Scientologists over a 1970s conspiracy to steal records about Scientology and its founder, L. Ron Hubbard. The stipulation describes Baum as a “Scientology covert operative” and says he was directed to “make weekly entries into [an Interpol office] where [he was] to methodically examine each file cabinet for any Interpol documents.”

The Genetic Literacy Project (GLP), a science advocacy nonprofit, says it asked Wisner Baum in 2019 to explain the firm’s connection to Scientology. GLP says that Wisner Baum did not respond and instead posted an article attacking GLP.

Scientology thanks Kennedy

Scientologists have praised Kennedy’s actions as HHS secretary to cast doubt on SSRIs.

The president of CCHR’s National Affairs Office called the May 4 initiative to stop “psychiatric overprescribing” an “extremely important step forward in correcting the nearly sole reliance on psychiatric drugs as mental health treatment—drugs which the latest scientific research finds do more harm than good.”

CCHR also issued a press release saying it “applauded the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) for launching a significant initiative to address psychiatric drug prescribing,” though it encouraged HHS to go further.

Kennedy’s actions are a win a long time in the making for Scientologists.

Hubbard began waging war on the field of psychiatry in the mid-20th century after his book on the pseudoscientific psychological treatments at the core of Scientology was rejected by the medical establishment. In a 1969 article, Hubbard wrote that “the psychiatrist and his front groups operate straight out of the terrorist textbooks” and said that a psychiatrist “kidnaps, tortures and murders without any slightest police interference or action by western security forces.” He also wrote later that psychiatry was the cause of crime.

Today, Scientologists carry on Hubbard’s hatred of psychiatry. A page on the official Scientology website says “[psychiatry] is [a] staggeringly profitable business. But while psychiatrists rake in billions, society receives a new generation of life-long drug addicts and thus still more customers for psychotropic drugs.” The website claims the diseases antidepressants are meant to treat do not exist, calling it all “an elaborate and deadly hoax.”