Dana Taylor

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This year isn't just history.

It's your competitive edge.

It's like, wow, this movie has really grown legs and has roots, and it's really, it's solidified itself as a moment.

In cities across the country, a growing number of American moms are embracing a lifestyle built around natural foods, fewer screens, homeschooling, and avoiding processed ingredients.

On the surface, it sounds like a return to simplicity, part back to the land, part clean living.

But something else is happening inside this movement, distrust of the medical system.

Conspiracy theories about vaccines abound amid a political shift toward Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

and his Make America Healthy Again agenda.

Hello and welcome to USA Today's The Excerpt.

I'm Dana Taylor.

Today is Wednesday, January 21st, 2026.

USA Today national extremism reporter Will Carlos has been reporting on the rise of so-called crunchy moms, the online ecosystem that shapes their beliefs and the very real consequences the movement poses to public health.

Will, thank you so much for coming back on the show.

Your piece starts with two mothers in suburban Cleveland who proudly describe themselves as crunchy.

They garden, check food labels, avoid dyes, and homeschool their kids.

Who are crunchy moms, Will, and how do they define themselves?

And this aligning with conservative or anti-establishment politics, what's driving that shift?

And then when we look at that contradiction, Will, how do they reconcile those two views?