Latest / REAP/SOW / Is the MAHA movement Roundup ready?
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- This transcript was exported on 04/28/2026 - view latest version here Theodore Ross: Welcome to Forked. 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. Vani Hari organized the People vs. Poison rally outside of the Supreme Court. Was it a success, or are the Trump administration's broken promises on glyphosate too much for the MAHA movement to swallow? Helena and I get into that and more on this episode. Helena, welcome back to Forked. It's so good to see you. I know you were on vacation. You are back and rested and ready to wrestle with the food policy issues of the day, I'm sure. Helena Bottemiller Evich: I'm not rested. [laughter] Helena: I had spring break with the almost two-year-old and a six-year-old, chasing them around. My children are so cute and so lovely, but they are feral, and I am tired. Yes, I am back from break. Theodore: In that case, welcome back to work, where you can relax. Helena: [laughs] Theodore: Let's get into it. As you all know, out there in Forkedland, we like to start every episode of this podcast with the double-take. Now, that's something in the food policy and politics news that makes you do a double-takey. Sometimes it's good, sometimes it's bad. It's always a little bit surprising. For me, I want to channel the wisdom of Ferris Bueller a little bit and say, "The farm bill moves pretty fast. If you blink, you just might miss it." What is happening? I know, Helena, that yesterday, and we are taping this on April 28th, it comes out in a week, the House Rules Committee, they held a hearing on the Farm, Food, and National Security Act of 2026, which I think is a nice little acronym of FIFRA, which is the farm bill, the skinny farm bill. The chair of the House Agriculture Committee, Glenn Thompson, a Republican of Pennsylvania, told everyone at that hearing how fantastic this bill was. More than 500 farm organizations have endorsed it, and even seven Democrats have joined Republican members of the committee in voting for it. However, some of the Democrats were not that happy. I'm going to quote Congresswoman Angie Craig, Democrat of Minnesota, the ranking member of the House Agriculture Committee, who said, "This bill is not ready for prime time, folks. It can be much improved, and it should be reworked to solve the biggest challenges facing family farmers." That is the current state of play, but there's more, Helena. Maybe you could get us into it. Helena: Yes, things are fluid right now. Just to give everyone a sense, I write a newsletter that comes out on Tuesday. This is usually completed Monday night, and then it's edited and fact-checked, and all the things. The top of that newsletter has been rewritten multiple times and probably will get rewritten again before it goes out because things are changing so quickly. As of this recording, what we can say is that House Republicans are trying to move forward on this farm bill, which, as you mentioned, is fairly partisan. There's a handful of Democrats that support it, but this is mostly a Republican farm bill. Democrats are still furious with Donald Trump's reconciliation package. Everyone called it the One Big Beautiful Bill or OBBB, whatever you want to call it. Theodore: They're trying to change the name, right? I don't know what the new name is, but it is very unsuccessful. They are sticking with the Beautiful one. Helena: I like to call it the reconciliation package. I feel like that's more neutral language. The reconciliation package did massive cuts to SNAP, billions and millions of dollars, biggest cut to SNAP spending that had been made in modern times. Democrats are furious about this, and they're like, "Why are we going to do a farm bill unless we're bringing back that money for SNAP?" It's really broken up what was left of this coalition between supporters of SNAP and supporters of farm policy, and these are always stitched together in the farm bill. Theodore: Let me just interrupt very briefly for people to understand. When we talk about the farm bill, much of the spending in the farm bill traditionally is on SNAP, right? Helena: Yes, low lion's share. Theodore: Exactly. If you are a Democrat and SNAP has been cut within the farm bill, the incentives for you to go along with the big ag parts of the farm bill, which is subsidizing our commodities growers in this country, it's not really all that high. That is the state of play. Helena: Democrats are essentially mad because they're not reinstating the SNAP spending. They're like, "You just cut all this SNAP spending outside the farm bill," which they view as a bad-faith move because it was not through regular order, which is the process of going through the farm bill. The reason they did that through reconciliation is that you don't have enough support in the Senate to make those kinds of cuts to SNAP in a bipartisan way to get 60 votes for that. That's all to say, there's a lot of bad blood over the farm bill. Democrats are really mad. This is a partisan farm bill, which means that Republicans, they have a really slim majority in the House. They have to stick together if they have any chance of getting this farm bill through. Even those seven Democrats, that's helpful that a few Democrats on the House Ag Committee are going to vote for this. Theodore: Well, "helpful," by the way. Helena: Well, it's helpful for them to move the bill. Theodore: It's helpful for them. Yes, exactly. Helena: They got to keep Republicans together if they have any chance of doing this. In the last 12 to 24 hours, there's been a full-blown MAHA revolt over some key provisions in this bill. The most controversial is language in the bill, it's in the bill right now, that would essentially preempt states from having additional warnings about pesticides or requiring additional warnings about pesticides. This is the same issue that's before the Supreme Court. This is the same issue that Bayer has been pushing in multiple forms. Theodore: Which we'll talk about in detail a little later in the show. Helena: They are pushing this in the farm bill. The MAHA advocates are furious about this. By the way, this isn't the only preemption provision. There's a couple of other controversial preemption provisions. One of them would block or would knock out Prop 12 in California and also Massachusetts Question 3. Those gestation crate bans. This is like a states' rights versus federal dynamic. Theodore: Let's pause for a second. We're talking about this. You sent me a Slack message this morning talking about a tweet from a congresswoman, Anna Paulina Luna. The tweet, I think it's just interesting language. It gets at what's actually happening. Helena: Is this the all-caps one I sent you? Theodore: It's the all-caps. I think all tweets should be all caps. If you're not tweeting in all caps, first of all, you shouldn't be tweeting. Second of all, you should be tweeting in all-caps. It just says, "MAHA REVOLT INITIATE," green check. This is going to date myself here. I hear that language, and you can tell us what it means in a second, but I hear, "WONDER TWINS, ACTIVATE." That's what I'm thinking of when I hear that. What did you tell everyone out there? What does it mean, "MAHA REVOLT INITIATE"? Is that me, or is she being an initiate? She's initiated into the MAHA revolt, or she is initiating a MAHA revolt? Helena: I've read that as she is celebrating that the revolt has been initiated. If you go to Vani Hari's X page, which we had Vani Hari on a few episodes ago, really a key voice within MAHA. She was one of the key organizers of the rally before the Supreme Court, which I know we're going to talk about. She was on Capitol Hill yesterday. If you go to her X page, up until midnight Monday night, she was basically putting pressure on members of Congress, calling them out for how ridiculous they think this preemption provision is on the pesticide issue in the farm bill. They were helping in real time, create problems for the farm bill. The House Rules Committee recessed and was unable to reconvene. Now, this isn't the only issue. They have other issues on other bills. Before the House Rules Committee, it's a hot mess expressed completely. They created a lot of problems for this farm bill. They basically threw a wrench in the process, and then were celebrating. All of the MAHA moms in this movement were online last night into the wee hours of the night, saying, "They're listening. Keep calling. We are shutting this down." Anna Paulina Luna actually threatened to "slaughter" the farm bill if the preemption provision is not pulled. It looks like as of this morning-- so this is fluid. This could change. This has not been locked in. As of this morning, we saw reporting from Meredith Lee Hill, who is a great House leadership or congressional leadership reporter who used to be on the pro-ag team at Politico. We were actually colleagues briefly. She is reporting that House leadership is actually now looking to get a vote on the amendment to strip the pesticide provision from the farm bill, so basically-- Theodore: Let's just translate that a little bit. We have the farm bill. It's out there being debated within the House. People call it the farm bill, but the farm bill is actually a compendium of many smaller bills. There are several of those bills in the farm bill itself that would essentially make it impossible to sue Monsanto/Bayer over glyphosate and Roundup. This is going to then isolate those bills and vote to have them pulled out of the farm bill. What it's saying is that the MAHA movement is, in some way, using its influence to create a different farm bill that would make what's happening in the Supreme Court somewhat moot. If not moot, it's a response to what's happening at the Supreme Court. Helena: Kind of. It's complicated because Bayer's pushing preemption on so many different fronts, right? They have tried to get this same language or similar language through a House spending bill earlier this year. MAHA blew that up. They are pushing for a preemption before the Supreme Court, which, actually, if they get that, you could argue maybe they don't need the language in the House farm bill, but they are pushing this in many ways. What the MAHA advocates look to be doing is forcing every member of Congress to actually vote on this individual provision, because it's just in the farm bill, it's language in the farm bill. When you vote for the farm bill as a whole, when this comes to the floor, if it comes to the floor, every individual member of the House will be able to vote, "Oh, I voted for the farm bill," "Oh, there may be a few things I didn't like," but they voted for the whole thing. When you force a vote specifically on the question of whether or not this language should be in there or not, you are forcing all those members of Congress to take a really controversial vote. The supporters of this pesticide preemption language, they don't want to force a vote. They don't want to force this hard vote because MAHA is out there really making this a controversial, difficult vote for people. I actually don't know how it would go down. Theodore: I think that's a good way for us to pivot to our next segment of the episode, which is Forks and Knives. It's the main meal, the biggest thing that's happening in food policy in the US right now. Now, we're going to anchor this in something that happened yesterday. That's April 27th, which was the people-- Well, it was two things, really. It was the Supreme Court hearing on this case, which is Monsanto v. Durnell, which gets at this issue surrounding glyphosate usage in this country, and warning labels, and cancer. Helena, I'll give you a chance to walk everybody very briefly through what the case is about. It's also about a rally held outside the Supreme Court called the People vs. Poison, which was a MAHA movement-led rally to attempt to pressure the Supreme Court not to rule in favor of Bayer/Monsanto. It was organized by Vani Hari. It was an interestingly bipartisan event. There were Republican-elected officials there. There were Democratic-elected officials there, including Senator Cory Booker, who made a speech. There were anti-vaxxers, including Del Bigtree. It was, as they say in politics, a pretty darn big tent. Let's just start very briefly. Tell people what's happening at the Supreme Court, because it gets back to what you're just saying about these votes on the farm bill in the House. Helena: The backdrop for all of this is that Bayer is facing hundreds-- Well, they're facing tens of thousands of cancer lawsuits, and they're on the hook for billions of dollars of liability. They have actually argued that the litigation landscape in the US could make it untenable to keep selling glyphosate in the US, which is a major, major tool for the modern agricultural-- Theodore: I just want to interject there for a second. The major, major tool, something like 90% of the commercially grown corn, and also a very high amount of cotton and soybean are what's called Roundup Ready. These are grown from seeds that have been treated to resist herbicides that can-- Helena: Genetically engineered, too. Theodore: Exactly, yes. What it means is that pretty much all of the corn and many of the other commodity crops in this country, they are built in a way by companies like Bayer/Monsanto to be used with glyphosate. If you got rid of glyphosate-ready crops, Roundup Ready crops, you basically don't have-- Well, there is no substitute for it. Eventually, I do want you to talk about, what, if any, plan would a MAHA-type person have for a post-Roundup Ready world look like? Stick with the Supreme Court. Helena: Yes, that's a good question. I don't think we've seen any serious plans about that. I think the way to think about glyphosate is it is just a leg of the stool. It is such a foundational part of the modern agricultural system. There really, I think, isn't a scenario in the short term where it is taken off the mark. I just don't foresee that happening. We talked about the executive order Donald Trump issued, arguing that, as a national security issue, we onshore more glyphosate production. They've basically argued that our food system would collapse. These are high-stakes things. I don't think anyone is seriously predicting that glyphosate would be pulled from the market. What Bayer is doing is they're trying to stop these lawsuits, right? They're trying to get out of the billions of dollars, class-action, individual lawsuits. They're just a torrent of lawsuits. What they're arguing before the Supreme Court is very similar to what they're trying to seek. They're not exactly the same, but they're seeking to essentially preempt states from being able to impose additional warning requirements. EPA has long maintained glyphosate is not likely to be a carcinogen. They don't require a cancer warning on it. Under these, what are called "right to warn" laws at the state level, plaintiffs have been bringing cases that essentially argue, "We should have been warned that there was an increased risk of cancer." They might have non-Hodgkin lymphoma, which there are studies linking occupational use to increased rates of non-Hodgkin lymphoma. Theodore: The named plaintiff in this case is a man named John Durnell, who got non-Hodgkin lymphoma. He blames that on use of Roundup. He's suing on the basis of saying that Monsanto and Bayer, they should have warned him. Helena: That's the basis of the vast majority of these lawsuits. That's why people refer to this as a liability shield. It's not technically a liability shield, but it acts as a de facto liability shield in this scenario because that's the basis for which all these lawsuits are made. This case before the Supreme Court actually rests on a weird technical thing, which we don't really need to get into. The basic issue is it's preemption, right? Does EPA have the final say? Are they the law of the land, or can states impose additional requirements? If someone does feel they were not warned, can they bring these cases? Theodore: The justices were pretty mixed on this, right? Helena: Yes, I didn't get to listen to it because I was outside. I heard that they were a bit more mixed then. I think going into it, a lot of the folks I was talking to thought that Bayer was going to win. I don't know that through the interpretation of oral arguments, I feel like it's a little bit more mixed. What did you read about that? Theodore: Well, just that Roberts, the Chief Justice Roberts, was somewhat skeptical of Bayer's arguments, and that there should be a role for the states to protect citizens in a case in which something is happening and the federal laws are not moving fast enough. I want to bring it back to what we were talking about with the House. The politics of this case are mushy, right? This case was moving its way through the courts under the Biden administration. The Biden administration was not fighting on the side of Bayer. They were taking the position that this case should go through. Under the Trump administration, that changed dramatically. EPA is now very much in favor of what Bayer is doing. This is one of the primary reasons that the MAHA movement is, A, mad at Lee Zeldin, who's the head of the EPA, mad at the EPA itself, and now increasingly mad at the Trump administration. There's the Supreme Court part of this, and then there's what's happening in Congress, where they're trying to force these votes. I guess the question for me and for you is, like, is this a meaningful use of political power? There's what's happening at that rally, which you attended, and I want to hear about, but there's also what's happening inside of Congress. It gets at a bigger debate, which is, does the MAHA movement have political power, especially in these midterm elections, which are coming up in just a few months? Helena: I don't know the answer to, does MAHA ultimately have political power in the midterms? Certainly, there are a lot of people making that argument. What I think is really clear is that MAHA does have political power. They have knocked the pesticide preemption provision out of an appropriations bill already. They have brought the House farm bill process to a halt. Now, I'm not saying they will succeed. I don't know. Even just forcing a vote on that provision is a display of power for an entity, movement, whatever you want to call it, band of advocates that did not exist or in this form even 18 months ago. In that way, they do have power. They are flexing. I think they're punching above their weight right now. We'll see what happens. I was at the rally, and there were a lot of-- Theodore: Sparsely attended, right? "Sparsely attended" is the term. Helena: Here's the thing. If they had not said 1,000 people had RSVP'd, I would have been like, "Oh, it's a decent turnout." Because I said 1,000 people RSVP'd, we were all like, "There's not 1,000 people here." Theodore: 150, right, yes. Helena: I thought maybe between 100 and 200, and a lot of them were reporters. Theodore: Getting Booker to be there and speak, that's a victory in and of itself, right? Helena: Senator Booker came and was really fired up. I have this in the newsletter. At one point, Sheryl Gay Stolberg from The New York Times, her Apple Watch started being like, "You're in a loud environment." The volume turned up. The crowd was-- Theodore: Howard Dean level of yelling. Yes, he was going for it. Helena: The crowd was really into it. I think you're right, and I use the term "big tent" in the newsletter as well. It was a big tent event. They had a lot of different factions. They had both parties represented. I do get the sense that there's some tension within MAHA in this moment, where they're trying to flex their political power, or they are flexing their power. It's like, do they go for the big tent and move in that direction, or is this the time to double down on their connection to the Republican side? The Republican side wants their help in the midterms. That's what their interest is in. There is some, I think, jockeying and push-and-pull in what direction they're going to do. Monday, it seemed big tent to me. Theodore: Let's talk about that because we're talking about the flexing of power. I think we have to reckon with what is the nature of that power. When we talk about campaign seasons, like midterm campaign seasons, or presidential election campaigns over time, there oftentimes is an emerging narrative of who is going to be the pivotal voting group. I remember from when I was a kid, this was in '96, the soccer moms, which ultimately didn't prove to be all that impactful in that presidential election. Then you flash-forward to 2009 with the Tea Party movement, which was hugely impactful. These are different groups that can take over how we talk about the election. Right now, in the midterms, the MAHA moms are one of the most powerful emerging narratives. What I think is interesting about it, and it gets to that big tent, there was an article in The Atlantic, I think yesterday, talking about the horseshoe nature of the MAHA movement politically. Horseshoe political movements, they're attracting the very far left and the very far right and using their power in that way. I think it originates in the idea of the similarities between the communists in Russia, in the Soviet Union, and the Nazi Party in World War II, but-- Helena: Yikes. [laughs] Theodore: Yes, I know. It's a term. It doesn't mean the MAHA movement is that. There is some belief that this is what the MAHA movement is. It captures the left or the ideology of the left, ideology of the right, but not at that rally. Not really, right? Booker is pretty mainstream. Massie's fairly-- he's a Republican, but he's pretty down the middle. What do you think? Helena: I think horseshoe applies. Massie and Pingree, the two members of the House that were there, they've worked together for a long time on things where the right and the left have agreed in the food movement. Things like more access to raw milk. Far left, far right tend to agree. It's been a little bit fringy. I think even a little more mainstream would be access to small-scale slaughter for farmers so that they can market their meat, expanded market opportunities for small farmers. They work together on those issues. There's always been this horseshoe element of the so-called food movement, right? Joel Salatin was at this rally. He is a conservative. I think he calls himself the lunatic farmer. He was featured heavily in The Omnivore's Dilemma, in Michael Pollan's book, and then was in Food, Inc. There's always been an element of that in the so-called food movement, where the right and the left move together and agree on some things. I think when you look at the populist nature of the MAHA movement, it makes sense. As the right starts adopting more of this anti-corporate populist rhetoric, it makes sense. They're going to agree on things like corporate consolidation, trying to limit corporate power. They don't like the way the big ag system is set up, the commodity. They agree on that stuff. It's always a question of, can they get enough? Can they put that enough in the mainstream that it moves the needle? I don't know. I think we're at the very beginning of even knowing the answer to that question. It's really interesting to watch. I think one of the reasons why there were so many reporters there is that it does feel like-- when we've talked about this so much, maybe they're listening to this podcast, but it does feel like there is a meaningful and really interesting political realignment that's swimming around this that people are trying to figure out. Theodore: I agree. There's definitely something happening. Helena: There's something happening. I don't know what it is. Theodore: The horseshoe element of it is really interesting to me. If you think back to 2009 and the Tea Party movement, that was a huge Republican wave pushed by the Tea Party. The thing that was animating them was opposition to Obamacare. They were really mad about that. The question is, today, it's a little different. Yes, potentially, glyphosate could be that kind of an issue. More broadly, the food issues that the MAHA movement is concerned about could be an issue. That could unite people to vote differently. I think, in a way, if that emerged as the issue that really made a difference in the midterm, it's the perfect example of what works in our hyper-polarized, geographically sorted, radically gerrymandered political age, that you have this issue that collects people from both of the extremes of these two parties, but not the middle so much. Helena: Well, I think it's hard to talk about MAHA. I see it as two things. There's MAHA, and there's the voters that identify with MAHA, which is actually a pretty small slice. Then there's the popular mainstream support for these ideas. If you just ask voters, "Do you support more regulation on pesticides used in agriculture?" it's overwhelming. Theodore: They absolutely do. Of course, yes. Helena: I think we're seeing right now where politicians on both sides of the aisle are starting to play around with this and jump into this more, I think in part because of MAHA. They're finding out where constituents do and don't light up on these issues. I think they're in the early stages of that. Cory Booker, Massie, and Pingree have all been talking about these issues for some time. Cory Booker has taken heat recently, particularly from key MAHA leaders, because they've long accused him of not wanting to work with Kennedy, which I think is true. People are really hesitant to- Theodore: He shouldn't work with Kennedy. Helena: -attach themselves, even when they agree on maybe what the policy is. There's been some weirdness. I think there's been a lot of hesitancy from Democrats. It was interesting to see a big tent there at the rally on Monday. It was actually pretty anti-Trump administration. Even Vani Hari, she said, basically, "We would not be here if the President hadn't signed this executive order." That was pretty stark from someone who's been an ally of this administration. She said something like, "You can't say you want to make America healthy again and then protect the people poisoning us." It was stark language. Sometimes you see from the MAHA folks, like, "Well, it's not Kennedy's fault." There's a lot of rationalizing. This was like, "We're pissed." Theodore: The "blink twice if Kennedy has been kidnapped" stuff, yes. Helena: I didn't hear Kennedy getting called out by name, really. The overwhelming vibe of that rally was, "We are angry. We are not going to take this anymore." Even if the Supreme Court gives Bayer a lot of liability protection from this torrent of lawsuits they're facing, they were like, "We are still fighting you." I think long-term, this is still a problem for Bayer. I think long-term, this is still a hot political issue. I don't know where it's going, but I don't think you can put this one back in the bottle. Theodore: Spicy stuff. Spicy stuff. All right. Why don't we move on to our final segment? I don't know if you have a good vibe prepared for this week. If you don't, I do. Helena: I forgot. I need one. Good. Good. I'm glad. Maybe I'll think of one. Theodore: I don't know if my leg really qualifies. It's a good vibe that exemplifies maybe more my sense of humor than an actual good vibe. I will talk about it anyway. On April 17th, Brooke Rollins, who is the Secretary of Agriculture, runs the USDA, created something called the Office of Seafood. If you read about it, it says, "One of the primary roles of this office will be coordinating across USDA agencies to ensure fishermen are integrated into USDA programs and working alongside the US Department of Commerce and other federal partners to revitalize the American seafood industry," which sounds fine to me. The seafood industry is in some trouble in the United States. Most of our seafood in this country is imported. However, what I thought was so weird, if you go to the USDA.gov website and you click on it, it opens up. You can scroll down. What you see is a lot of cows, mostly. You see farmland, pastureland, animals walking around. When you go to the Office of Seafood, you see a boiled lobster, right? To me, I look at it, I'm like, "Oh, is it a government office, or is it a Red Lobster ad?" I just find that amusing. Seafood, yes, you eat seafood, but it's not the Office of Aquaculture. There's not pictures there of oyster harvesting and capturing shrimp and shucking-- not even shucking oysters. It's a lobster. There's no drawn butter, but that is that. For me, that is enough amusement to provide me with a good vibe. What do you think? Does that qualify, or should we rule that out? Do you want to veto it? [laughter] Helena: I have no comment on that. I have no comment on that. It's always interesting that other entities want more from USDA. I think that's an argument that folks, particularly in aquaculture, which is a different type of farming, oyster farming, and other shellfish operations, they have long wanted more attention from USDA, but it is also coming at a time when this administration is very much trying to shrink USDA, move offices outside of DC. They're shutting down buildings. It's coming at a strange time for USDA. I'll say that. Theodore: A strange image. I'm sticking with it. It's a good vibe for me. All right, Helena, I think that's enough for this episode. It's been a great conversation. As I always like to do at the end, before I thank you for being such a great person to talk to about food policy and food politics, why don't you tell everyone out there about your newsletter, which I have to say in advance, it's pretty darn good. Helena: Thank you. If folks are not getting Food Fix, you can go to foodfix.co or just google Food Fix newsletter. Get on the list. There's so much going on. Every week, it's a good read. I recently met someone who told me they have a task set for Friday afternoon to remind them to make sure they read the newsletter. That was just the nicest thing anyone has ever said. [laughs] Theodore: Wow, that's pretty good. All right, I'll add a compliment. My brother saw you on PBS last night and said, "She was good, knows what she's talking about." That's high praise from my brother. Helena: That is very kind. Thank you. Theodore: Well, Helena, as always, thank you so much. It is so much fun to talk to you about all these issues. I will see you in a couple of weeks. Helena: Always a pleasure. See you soon. Bye. Theodore: 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 producer and video producer is Amanda Vicari. 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 www.thefern.org. Forked Ep 21.mp3 (Completed: 04/28/2026) Transcript by GoTranscript.com