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How the MAHA Commission’s strategy doc was a win for Big Ag · REAP/SOW

• Theodore Ross: Welcome to Forked: Food Politics in the MAHA Age. I’m Theodore Ross, editor-in-chief of the Food & Environment Reporting Network, and I’m joined by my co-host, Helena Bottemiller Evich from Food Fix. In this episode, we talk about the MAHA Commission strategy document. Is it a bust or just the beginning? We also cover how USDA is giving money to farm-to-school initiatives, but only after taking it away. And finally, got whole milk? Helena, how are you? Welcome back to Forked, where we’re going to talk all about the food and all about the politics, and sometimes both at the same time. How’s it going? Helena: I’m doing well. How are you? Theodore: I’m good. Why don’t we jump right in. So the first thing we like to start off with every time on Forked is something that we call the double take. And that is something — I’m just going to move my mic a little closer to my mouth so that my sound designer does not get mad at me. Helena: We don’t want that. Theodore: No, we don’t want that. So we start off with the double take, and that is something in the food and political world that just kind of makes you do a double take because it’s so shocking or unusual. Usually not so great. And the one that I think we should start off with is the announcement a little while ago now by Brooke Rollins, the head of the USDA, where she said that the USDA would make the largest single investment in U.S. history to the Patrick Leahy Farm to School Grant Program: $18 million for fiscal year 2026. Woo-hoo. That’s a good thing. Only problem was that back in June, they cut $10 million from the same program. So, Helena, tell me what’s going on here? What should we make about this? Helena: I was going to say, we’re not counting the $1 billion that was canceled. Theodore: No, no, no. We’re not counting, we’re just talking about 18 million coming in after 10 million went out. Helena: Yeah. So look, I think if you take a step back, it’s kind of surprising that we haven’t seen more investment earlier, because this stuff is so popular and so bipartisan. Farm-to-school is a home run across the board. Small towns, urban areas, I mean, it just doesn’t matter, it’s popular. And so watching Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins take so much heat after canceling a billion dollars in local food funding that was specifically earmarked for food banks and schools,, one of the, you know, early moves of the administration. I remember I was watching her — I don’t remember where she was — and she said she was getting asked about that everywhere she went, right? So there was political heat and a lot of negative headlines. And this obviously raises a lot of questions about MAHA. This seems anti-MAHA, this flies in the face of MAHA. They want more local food, more whole foods. So seeing some investment, you know, a stepped-up investment in this specific farm-to-school program makes a lot of sense politically. I think policy-wise, most people agree that it’s something that makes sense. But again, it always comes in this contradiction of, are they really ending up ahead? Do they have more money? And everyone’s still really upset about that billion dollars. Theodore: I think before we even net out whether or not we’re ahead or behind on the investments and the recissions, I think we should look a little bit about what they’re actually doing. Now, some of this seems to be fairly necessary reform, a simplification of the process to get these programs, these grants made and get food to kids. But it also does certain things, right? I mean, one of the biggest things it seems to me is that it rewards size, right? It makes the minimum level of the grants something like $50,000. The example I saw in Civil Eats, they talk about how it used to be, in 2022, there was this rural South Dakota school district, they have just 300 kids. And they get $23,000 to develop partnerships with local farms that allow them to get meals brought to school and field trips to teach kids about farming. You can’t do that under the way the now streamlined, more efficient process is concerned. And the other thing that it seemed to do, by and large, is remove any whiff of DEI as it relates to these programs. So, again, how do we think about this? Is this better? Certainly in some ways it’s not better. Should it be for bigger grants? What do you think of it? Helena: Well, I’m not sure about the details and how they really net out and whether or not it’s better. I think the question of how big the grants should be, you know, that really comes down to how the farm-to-school operators are actually using the program, and hopefully USDA is getting feedback on that. I don’t know how much they’re receptive to the feedback if it’s coming from groups that they deem are more progressive. I just don’t know. And so I would really hope that we could get to a place where farm-to-school goes back to being this nonpartisan, bipartisan … Theodore: But that’s not going to happen. We’re not anywhere near that. And I think that’s actually — thank you for saying that — a pretty good transition to what is most likely — not most likely — what is the largest domestic thing happening in the news as we’re doing this taping. And that is the killing of Charlie Kirk, the assassination of Charlie Kirk. So maybe you can walk me through a little bit of how he is connected to the things that we talk about on this show, which is food and politics, the MAHA movement. Helena: Yeah, I think maybe not a lot of listeners will know that Charlie Kirk played a really pivotal role in the MAGA-MAHA alliance, that fateful alliance from about a year ago between Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and President Trump, right before the campaign, or the election, and a lot of folks within Trump’s orbit think that this alliance really helped Trump win. Okay, so this is a crucial political alliance. But Charlie Kirk was very supportive of this alliance. He was very supportive of MAHA from the get-go. He also, I think, was pretty supportive of RFK Jr. He’d had him on his podcast, and I’ve watched Charlie Kirk’s podcast quite a bit in the last year because he would have MAHA figures on and sort of talk to them about what their agenda is and all that. And I just watched — Robert F. Kennedy Jr. actually appeared at, there was a Charlie Kirk memorial at the Kennedy Center recently, and he spoke, and he actually described Kirk as, quote, the primary architect of my unification with President Trump. So, really played a pivotal role there. I personally just disagreed with Charlie Kirk on a lot of things, particularly civil rights issues, primarily things like that, right? I would just go on the record with that. But watching all of this unfold, I mean, there’s just no other word than horrifying. I mean, it’s a real gut check for America. Where are we in this moment, where violence is so common across the board. And, you know, I’m watching a lot of reckoning happening and of course there is a MAHA angle in all of this as well. Theodore: All right, well, I just didn’t want to let this go unremarked upon. I agree with you. Political violence is a terrible thing. I don’t feel that I’m obligated to have an opinion on the death of Charlie Kirk. That’s not necessarily, I think I’m a little far away from that issue to say specifically, other than … Helena: You don’t want anyone to die or be murdered. Theodore: I don’t want anybody getting killed. But, you know, I see in my social media circles, my political circles, my family group chat — God only knows what’s going on there right now. There’s good stuff in the family group chat. But that’s what I have a family group chat for, to share my opinions about the death of Charlie Kirk. I think for us, we can look at him in the MAHA context and leave the broader potential looming civil war stuff to the people who are focusing on that subject. Helena: I hope not. Theodore: I’m not looking for a civil war either. Helena: That’s civil war as well. I’ll be sure about that. But yeah, I think anytime something big like this happens, there should be a lot of national reflection. And so I hope that’s where we’re headed. Theodore: That again, I doubt it, but let’s leave it at that, I guess. So our next segment for the show is Forks and Knives, and it is the main dish, the thing that’s happening in the United States in food and politics right now. And I think that’s a fairly obvious thing, even though it’s a little bit after the fact now, but it’s the release of the MAHA Commission’s strategy document. Helena, I’ll ask you to talk a little bit about it, but really, I want you to talk about it in the context of a question I have, which is, did RFK Jr. and the MAHA Commission roll over to Big Food and Ag like, say, I don’t know, a bear cub, maybe? Helena: Well, I think the MAHA strategy certainly rolled over to Big Ag. There’s just so much evidence of that. I mean, there’s just no way to argue that the MAHA report’s strategy is in line with particularly RFK Jr.’s rhetoric on agriculture, specifically his alarm over pesticides and how, you know, concerned we all should be. This is what he’s been arguing on the campaign trail and also as HHS secretary. Theodore: Let’s just stop a second for people who aren’t completely following this. It almost does not mention pesticides. Helena: It completely folds on the entire concept of any need for a crackdown on pesticides. I mean, agriculture groups praised this document. My inbox was full of farm and different commodity groups praising this, praising the commission for listening to the industry, for letting them have a seat at the table. I mean, it was really across the board positive. Interestingly, I think the question is a little more nuanced when you look at Big Food. So no food companies and no food trade groups were in my inbox actively praising this document. Theodore: But it was a similar thing again, like when you look at what’s not in the document, one mention of the word sugar. Nothing. No mention of high-fructose corn syrup. A lot of things that were already part of the dietary guidelines, which is, like, Hey, don’t eat so much sugar. It’s not so good for you. It’s about at that level. So why should they not be feeling as happy as the corn growers and soybean growers of the world? Helena: Because on the ag stuff, it completely avoids any of the controversial issues. On the food stuff,I would say that it doesn’t call for a big crackdown on the food industry. So that’s where they win, right? But there’s still a lot that the food companies hate. And I think what I am really seeing is the difference in political power. The agriculture industry totally won this wrestling match. They were, like, get us out of the MAHA sights, right? They were mainly, like, get out of this. The food stuff, though, is a little bit more nuanced. There are a few things in here that food companies really hate, so there’s not some — I mean, I think the biggest criticism of the MAHA report is it doesn’t have a lot of regulatory teeth, right? It uses the term “deregulation” more. Theodore: Absolutely. It is a deregulatory document. We’re going to talk about this a little later on, when we talk about some of the good vibes that are in this document. But it is, at its heart, a very, very serious deregulatory document. Helena: Yes. Although there’s a couple of exceptions in here that I think are interesting to point out. So it does say that they might do front-of-pack labeling, which would be regulatory. I do think this is an important caveat. We don’t know that they’re going to do this for sure. Theodore: But I might do a lot of things. There are a lot of things I might do. I might get up and walk away from this microphone while we’re doing the podcast, but I probably won’t, right? Helena: So there’s a lot of language, like, you know, “might explore” or “will explore potentially.” Theodore: That’s right. Helena: So there’s that kind of language, and I think it’s really important to be honest about that language. That there’s a lot of wiggle room to get out of this stuff. But I am hearing top officials mention front-of-pack labeling more. I think the chances that they are going to do something on that are increasing. So we’ll see. That would be a regulatory thing that the FDA could do, that could be a real thing. Theodore: And a good thing, and a useful thing. That would be good. Helena: A lot of the nutrition folks think that would be a good thing done right. A lot of other countries are doing front-of-pack labeling to try to encourage changes in consumption. So that’s a potential, okay? But with a lot of mealymouthed language, okay? There’s also — one thing I think was surprising is they had a line in there about marketing to kids. And that was surprising. But again, it was very mealymouthed. So I’m actually going to read what it said. It said: “Guidelines to Limit Direct Marketing of Certain Foods to Children: HHS and FTC, along with other relevant agencies, will explore the development of potential guidelines to limit the marketing of certain unhealthy foods to children.” So the fact that it was in there at all, I think, is like, oh, wow, that’s kind of surprising. This is a third-rail issue for the food industry. But again, it does not say: We will do this. It does not say … Theodore: I think we have to hold politicians and regulatory makers to certain kinds of standards. That is — and this is a technical term here — bupkis, right? They may do all this stuff, but that does not say, that does not obligate, that does not do anything. Helena: None of these reports obligate them. Theodore: Nothing. Nothing. Helena: We’ll see. If they did that, that would be a big thing. They did talk about GRAS, or Generally Recognized as Safe, reform. That is one thing the industry, or the FDA has committed to doing. But again, we haven’t seen a proposal yet. We are a long way from that being done. And one thing that I’m noticing is that a lot of these Trump officials are talking about GRAS reform or food additive reform as if it has already happened. It has not happened. They have not proposed it yet. That will be a significant change if they do it, so that we’ve got to watch and actually hold their actions. You know, we’ve got to watch their actions, not just what they say. It totally whiffs on pesticides. It barely mentions sugar — it mentions it once — does not mention seed oils. There’s so many things in here that MAHA was so worked up about and is so worked up about that are completely avoided in this report. So the rhetoric does not match this. Theodore: Absolutely. not Helena: No way, shape, or form. Theodore: So I want to pass on from some of the details from the report and talk about some of the politics surrounding it. But before we do that, there are some strange things in there, or maybe they’re not so strange. Maybe they make sense for RFK Jr. and where this movement is going. There are definitely things in there about fluoride. We’re going to be looking at fluoride hard. We’re going to also, there was a section, very short section on repurposed drugs, right? So is this opening the floodgates to Ozempic, which is a repurposed drug. It’s a diabetes drug that’s used for weight loss. Is it that they’re getting at, or is it that we’re talking ivermectin for all? What does this mean? Helena: I have no idea about that. I’m going to be frank. I have no idea. There’s a lot of other things in here about, you know, trying to reorient NIH research. To be looking more at root causes. And I think all of those things, again, are like words until they are actually enacted. Is there going to be funding? That is the big question. You can just say all of these things, and it just does not matter unless you are actually putting your money where your mouth is. And so some of this is like, okay, I mean, you’re saying this, but we need to see are they actually investing in nutrition research? So we don’t know yet, and I think it’s important to separate those things. I mean there’s also some stuff in here around … Theodore: Synthetic opioids, electromagnetic radiation. Helena: Which I know nothing about. You know, I think all consumers are, like, yeah, we should be studying things like microplastics and any type of, you know, outside force technology, chemical. If it can harm us, we should be studying those things. I think most reasonable people agree about that. Theodore: But it doesn’t seem like a heavy priority, right? There’s more on fluoride in this document than there is on microplastics. Frankly, I mean, I’m no scientist. I don’t want to set myself up on this, but I worry more about microplastics than I do about fluoride. Helena: Yeah. The fluoride debate is a little bit more nuanced, I think. You can read about it. There is a little bit of changing science on fluoride. Not that we need to yank it out of water systems — we know that it reduces cavities. But there is, I think, a science-based, nuanced discussion to have on that. What’s happening is there’s a moral panic about it, and states are just ripping it out of the water without maybe considering the broader consequences. And so it’s become a social issue, which I think… Theodore: Isn’t it a question of pride of place? I mean, this document is supposed to take on the big priorities in the United States as it relates to the food system, and fluoride takes up a fair amount of oxygen in there. That the problem, right? Helena: It’s a red meat political issue now. Whereas microplastics are really hard, because, I think, if you ask the average consumer: We’re finding microplastics in, you know, placentas and our blood and our brains and everything. Is that something we should be concerned about? People would be, like, yeah. But to meaningfully take on microplastics, you have to take on the plastic industry, food packaging. Theodore: And it’s in everything. It’s a very, very difficult problem to solve. Helena: It’s a really difficult problem, and it involves taking on, basically, capitalism. I mean, really, that’s what it involves. So there’s certain things like that where you’re, like, oh well, I see why you whiffed on this, right? Because it’s really hard. And, you know, I do think it’s important to note that it’s not like the Biden administration was taking it on. Theodore: No, I think that’s fair. I just think that it’s the question of the priorities. When you read the document — and it’s only 20 pages long — there’s some weird stuff happening there. But I want to pass along, pass on from the 128 recommendations there. I mean, by the way, I just love the way that HHS describes it: there’s the 128 recommendations in this document, which are unprecedented, historic, super-duper Oh my God, they’re so great. It’s just an amazing document tonally, right? It’s not what you think, what you’re going to get. It is by no means a staid policy document. It is very much a political document. Helena: Yeah. And I think folks need to go back and read other similar documents. You know, back during the Obama administration, they released a lengthy strategy against childhood obesity. Like this stuff. I’ve read other documents. This is pretty light. This is 20 pages. Theodore: It’s a primer. Helena: Yeah, it’s pretty high level, and I think, you know, you could argue there’s some benefits to keeping it high level. There’s less specific promises to hold them to. I also think there’s a lot of fighting over this document. Theodore: And more fighting to come. I want to talk about the political reaction to it within the world of MAHA. And I think there are two sort of interesting reactions, public reactions, that are worth talking about. But I’d like to get you to respond to it. One is from — and I just love these names. I mean, it’s Vani Hara. She’s known as the Food Babe. And she says that the strategy document is declaring war on ultraprocessed foods, right? Which seems a pretty hard case to press, but, free country. Helena: You could commit to defining ultraprocessed foods. Theodore: Defining, but it’s not declaring war. Not exactly. And then there is one from Zoe Honeycutt, from Moms Across America. Helena: Zen Honeycutt. Theodore: Excuse me, I’m sorry. Zen Honeycutt. She is the executive director of Moms Across America. It’s a grassroots advocacy group that Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is on the board of, on its board of advisers. And she calls this document blatant pandering to the pesticide companies. So, you know, I think if you’re in the sort of liberalish, centrist media, wherever you and I may be in some sort of way, there’s always this idea that, oh, now’s the time where they’re really going to turn on each other. They’re going to go after each other. The thing has been broken open, and now it’s open warfare within whatever group on the right people are upset about. I don’t think that’s going to happen, but I’m curious what it means to have this level of disagreement among people who are pushing this movement, whose politics are not quite understood that well yet. Helena: Well, a lot of these groups were pretty clear. A lot of the advocates within MAHA, if they work on pesticide issues, they were, like,, these are agrochemical industry talking points. I mean, they were pretty clear on that, because not only does this document not call for a crackdown on pesticide regulation, it actually suggests that agencies need to embark on an initiative to make sure we all understand how well our current regulatory system is working. Theodore: The language, the language on it is amazing. Helena: Which is not the stance in any way, shape, or form of MAHA. They not only are deeply alarmed about pesticides on the market, especially ones that may be banned in other places, but they want these pesticides out, like, banned, right? And so this is not some line you can walk between, right? And I think that the strategy chooses the industry side — that’s just kind of a fact. So they’re open in their criticism. What’s interesting, though, is they don’t blame Kennedy. They don’t, even though, you know, he’s the chair of this MAHA Commission. . Obviously, this is his report that he unveiled, they unveiled it at HHS. They don’t seem to blame him at all. And even Trump. It’s like, oh, well the industry’s just like influencing this process. Or, you know, they influence the government, and there isn’t a lot of heat directed at Kennedy himself. It’s just interesting because I think were it someone else, you would see a lot more heat directed at that person, that they have, you know, caved. There were a lot of people who thought Michelle Obama eventually became too easy on the food industry, because they did a lot of private-sector partnerships. Well here you see Kennedy. Kennedy is doing these private-sector commitments to get dyes out of food instead of banning them. And it’s sort of amazing to watch that be a completely fine approach when people weren’t happy that Michelle Obama did that. Theodore: The political math is there to be done, I’m sure, but it ain’t easy. It is not algebra, it’s calculus, right, to figure out what these reactions mean. Helena: I didn’t do particularly well in calculus. Theodore: This is a show for English majors, not math students. So let’s pass on to our final segment, which is the good vibe, and that is something within the world of food and politics that offers a particle, a shred, a maybe PFAS-size particle of hope out there. And what I wanted to focus on, which I think is a somewhat controversial choice, is in the MAHA strategy document they call for the return of whole milk to the school lunch programs. What do you think of that? Helena: Oh, man. So I think it’s happening, first of all. I think whole-fat dairy is going to be treated very favorably by the dietary guidelines update that we’re going to see some point before the end of the year. The timeline has been very unclear on that. Is it good or is it bad? It really depends on who you ask. So there’s a lot of folks within public health who are just, like, this just doesn’t make sense. We should be limiting saturated fat overall. UThe preponderance of evidence does not support this. They’re also concerned about kids and calories and all those things. But there is also a lot more nuance in the scientific debate over not just saturated fat, but specifically dairy fat, and whether or not we may need a more nuanced view of that. Particularly for things like yogurt, and it is kind of a hot mess in terms of the messaging to consumers and how we’re supposed to interpret all this. I’m genuinely confused on the regular, and I literally cover food policy. Theodore: I think it’s an interesting sort of way to tell it. It’s hard to interpret what it means, certainly from a nutrition perspective, but you know, for example, in my family, I have three kids. At home, certainly, we always had whole milk. I don’t like the taste of 2 percent milk. So that’s what we had at home. Plus I thought that if I was going to have my children expending their fat budget, right, I’d rather them do it on whole milk than, say, junk food. So I was okay with it, but I understand that people … Helena: And that may be supported by evidence actually, because, yeah. So the thing that’s about to happen is that the dietary guidelines are going to say saturated fat, you know, we don’t need to limit it. That’s what they’re going to say, probably, something to that effect. And then you’re going to have parts of the nutrition establishment, like in the scientific community, are going to say, this is an unscientific recommendation, right? And they’re going to attack the dietary guidelines. And then we’re going to have — I think we’ve talked about this a little bit before — we’re going to have multiple types of nutrition advice. So you’re going to have the dietary guidelines, and then you’re going to have maybe Harvard or other groups saying, No, here is actually the real dietary guidelines. Similar to what we’re seeing actually on vaccines. You don’t trust the CDC schedule? Well, here’s the American Academy of Pediatrics schedule. Theodore: I think that’s a really important point. That’s a really, really important point. Because if you look where in the strategy document this recommendation about milk comes, it’s in a section called Food Deregulation. It’s one of the complexities of the MAHA movement itself, because if you look at some of those proposals they’re making, some of them — and I say this without knowing all the details of them — but many of them sound pretty good, right? You know, there’s one thing about … Helena: PReducing technology in schools. Theodore: Eliminating zoning restrictions so you could have mobile grocery units in food deserts. I think it is very much worth looking at some of these proposals and trying to understand if they’re good or bad. But they are all nestled within a deregulatory framework. Which, when you talk about, okay, California’s got its vaccine regulations, New York’s got its thing, and everybody’s doing different things. To me, what it suggests is that the goal, maybe not specifically just to MAHA but the Trump administration itself, is not really based on a particular form of government. It’s on destruction of government, right? That’s the real thing that’s being put forward. When you look at, okay, we’re going to have whole milk back in the schools, and if you like whole milk, that’s good for you. But really what you’re doing is undermining the ideas that are the reason behind why we have a government in the first place, right? Helena: Well, you know, it’s hard, because school meals are a government program, right? So even having milk at all in schools is fundamentally a government program, right? I can’t remember what the percentage is, but a really significant percent of the fluid milk in the whole country goes to federal school meals programs. Theodore: That’s where kids drink it. I mean, my kids had milk in their cereal at home. My kids drank a lot of milk. Helena: I drank a lot of chocolate milk growing up. Theodore: Yeah, same here. But that’s what they drank at school, right? That was it. You know, it wasn’t juice boxes. It was milk. Helena: I think the other interesting thing about the whole milk is that, first of all, it’s a bipartisan issue. It actually got voted on in the House, and it was bipartisan in terms of who supported it. I can’t remember what the vote breakdown was, but it was like … Theodore: Whole-fat milk, whole-fat milk. Helena: Whole milk was actually voted on in the House. I mean, it was remarkable. I can’t remember what else was going on, but I remember thinking, how did this get a vote? It’s so hard to get a vote on anything. It shows you the power of the dairy industry and some other things. Theodore: And kids. Shows you the power of kids. I mean, people care about their kids. Helena: Yeah, except for we haven’t been updating the school meals legislation. We’re supposed to do it every five years. Congress doesn’t care that much, and they’re not going to spend more money. And the money thing is what really matters here because if you want whole milk in all the schools, you’re going to have to spend more money. It costs more money. And so one of the reasons that schools may not transition to whole milk, even if it’s allowed … Theodore: Too expensive. Helena: It’s too expensive. And so if you want to fundamentally — and I say this all the time because this is just a statement of fact — if you want to fundamentally change what is served in schools, you have to spend more money. You have to actually reform whether or not these schools have kitchens. You have to make sure they have adequate staff. There is no way to radically transform what is served in schools without spending more money. That’s just a fact, and that is what everyone seems unwilling to discuss. Theodore: I think if that were to happen, it would be a true good vibe. So I’m going to ask us to stop. Helena: There we go. There we go. Theodore: I’m going to ask you to stop right there. I think that that’s a good note for us to stop on — spend more money on your schools because it’s good for your kids. I think that’s a good message to take away from this. Helena, before we sign off for this episode, why don’t you tell us about that fantastic newsletter that you have and how we can find it? Helena: Yeah, if you’re into food policy, you can go to foodfix.co and sign up to get on the newsletter. It comes out every Friday. It’s free, and if you love it, you can upgrade to a paid subscription. Theodore: Another thing you can pay for. There you go. Helena: Yeah. I cover all of this stuff, and more. Theodore: Well thank you very much. I always look forward to talking with you and learning all these new things and sometimes old things about food and politics. Thank you so much. I’ll see you in a couple of weeks. Helena: Thank you. See you soon. Theodore: All right. Forked is a production of the Food & Environment Reporting Network.Our executive producers are me, Theodore Ross, and Tom Laskawy. Our sound engineer is Lauryn Newson. Our producers and video producers are Maya Okindo and Katie Gardner. Our hosts are Helena Bottemiller Evich and me, Theodore Ross. To find out more about FERN and donate to support our independent nonprofit reporting, go to thefern.org.