MAHA Movement Fracturing On Pesticides

I’m back from vacation, and the top reports that I’ve been catching up on are all surrounding Make America Healthy Again. There’s been a major test of Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s leadership transpiring: More than 200 MAHA activists signed a letter to President Donald Trump asking to block the U.S. House bill limiting the regulation of pesticides and ‘forever chemicals’—which includes liability shields for pesticide companies. Reuters reports that these MAHA supporters warn that allowing the appropriations bill to proceed could imperil Republicans’ House majority in upcoming elections .

And the pressure from these core MAHA voters is mounting at the same time as corporate agricultural interests and farm lobbyists are pushing from the opposite end—as they worry about “a crackdown on agrochemicals.”

This is where the MAHA Commission’s highly anticipated second report comes into play. Recall the first report, published in May, which mentions pesticides some 25 times for their potential risk to human health. MAHA devotees said it didn’t go far enough, while many in the agriculture industry were sent reeling. The second edition was set to publish this week, but is now delayed.

And there’s a lot of speculation as to why, and particularly how much has to do with the fractures emerging within the MAHA movement. And as Stat News points out, this is also playing out as Kennedy is facing blame for inciting the deadly shooting last Friday at the headquarters for the Centers for Disease Control and Protection by an anti-vaxxer gunman.

CNN reports that the second MAHA report has been expected to “propose strategies and reforms to tackle” issues laid out in the first report, and that those actions could include a presidential executive order or ending certain federal policies that “exacerbate the health crisis” and “adding powerful new solutions.” But Politico is reporting that the White House has given assurances to agriculture lobbyists that the forthcoming report “will not include new policy around pesticide use.”

We shall see. As Marion Nestle wrote this week in her newsletter, Food Politics, “Clearly, much is at stake. It looks like MAHA versus the realities of MAGA.”

On that note, as I transition back from being out-of-office, here’s your friendly reminder to soak up as much of summer as you can right now. Make the most of these last few weeks!

— Chloe Sorvino

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