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The Trump administration declared victory after Kraft Heinz, Skittles and General Mills made splashy announcements to remove artificial colors — even taking credit for Coca-Cola’s plan to replace high-fructose corn syrup with US cane sugar in a new version this fall.
“President Trump delivers on MAHA (Make America Healthy Again) push,” the White House said last month, touting the companies’ changes to “confront the chronic health crisis plaguing Americans.”
But nutritionists and public health researchers don’t buy the hype.
So far, companies have only made performative changes, they say, many of which were long in the works due to consumer demand for natural ingredients. Meanwhile, the administration’s funding cuts for health care, food stamps, research and public health programs run contrary to its goal of making Americans healthier.
“These are cosmetic changes with no health impact. They just allow the MAHA people to say they had a victory,” said Dr. Barry Popkin, a professor of nutrition at the University of North Carolina. “It’s just PR.”
Health advocates do credit Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the Health and Human Services Department secretary, and his MAHA movement for bringing attention to unhealthy foods, chronic disease and major companies’ influence on the food system in America. But researchers say Kennedy’s focus on synthetic dyes misses the larger problem of the prevalence of cheap, convenient foods loaded with salt, sugar and fat.
Ice cream is still ice cream and soda is still soda, even without artificial flavors, Popkin said.
A spokesperson for the HHS said Kennedy is “dismantling the status quo that fueled a nationwide chronic disease epidemic” and “eliminating bureaucracy and restoring integrity to federal health programs.”
“HHS is confronting the root causes of chronic illness that previous administrations were too timid to address,” the spokesperson added.
But for Kennedy and the administration to make a substantive impact on Americans’ diets, researchers say they will have to implement policies that tightly regulate ultraprocessed foods.
Ultraprocessed foods account for up to 70% of the US food supply, and include many popular brands of chips, cookies, candy, ice cream and pre-made meals. Studies have frequently linked them to obesity, cancer, diabetes, heart disease and other health disorders.
Kennedy has called the easy availability of these foods a “crisis,” and oversaw the White House’s Make America Healthy Again Commission report released in May that identifies ultraprocessed foods as a key contributor to a national rise in chronic illnesses — particularly among children.
The agency has yet to enact any significant measures to cut down on ultraprocessed foods.
“Right now, they’re not going after the real food culprit,” Popkin said. “If Kennedy does anything significant on ultraprocessed foods, it will be hugely important for health.”
Synthetic dyes, made from petroleum, are often used to make food and beverages brightly colored and appealing to customers, especially children. But they have potential negative effects on animal and human health, including possible increased risk of cancer and neurobehavioral issues in some children. In January, the US Food and Drug Administration banned red dye No. 3 in food, beverages and ingested drugs.
Kennedy has been pressuring food companies to voluntarily remove all food dyes from their products. But many have been moving away from synthetic dyes for years due to pressure from consumers, health advocates and bans or restrictions in states like California, Virginia and West Virginia.
For example, both Kraft Heinz and General Mills — which the administration recently celebrated for pledging to remove synthetic colors — have already removed the additives from most of their products.
“(As) much as I love the idea of getting rid of artificial colors, doing so is a nutritionally meaningless way of giving compliant junk foods the aura of health foods,” said Dr. Marion Nestle, an emeritus professor of nutrition and food studies at New York University.
Roughly 64% of consumers now actively look for snacks perceived as “good for them,” a figure that has increased sharply in recent years, according to market research firm Circana. Yogurt, cheeses and foods and drinks with protein have proliferated due to their nutritional appeal.
This is also not the first time companies have made voluntary pledges to remove artificial dyes from their products. But many have backtracked on their commitments.
“We hope industry will voluntarily improve the food supply this time around,” said Aviva Musicus, the science director at the Center for Science in the Public Interest, a nonprofit consumer advocacy group. “There has to be a plan to hold industry accountable for when they inevitably don’t cooperate. I haven’t seen that for this administration.”
The Consumer Brands Association, a trade group representing major food, beverage and household product companies, did not respond directly to this criticism. But the group pointed to an April statement that said the industry has “always prioritized transparency and it will continue to lead the way to ensure consumers have the information they want and need to make informed purchasing decisions.”
And slapping foods with a broad definition of ultraprocessed may result in “demonizing safe, shelf-ready foods” that will limit consumers’ access to nutritious foods, the group said.
Cuts to Medicaid and SNAP
While HHS focuses on food additives, many of the Trump administration’s other policies weaken government efforts to improve the food supply and Americans’ health, critics say.
Trump’s sweeping tax and spending cuts package is expected to leave 10 million more people without health insurance in 2034, according to a Congressional Budget Office estimate.
More than 22 million families will lose some or all of their Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits, according to the Urban Institute. The law eliminated funding for programs that offer cooking classes and nutrition education for SNAP recipients, and the Agriculture Department cut two pandemic-era programs that help schools and food banks buy from local farmers.
“While MAHA leadership celebrates hollow wins, we’ve seen the federal government cut SNAP benefits for millions of Americans, rip millions from their health insurance coverage (and) slash programs to help farmers bring local foods into schools,” Musicus said.
The administration is not just cutting health care and food benefits — it also slashed billions in research funding and fired thousands of employees at the National Institutes of Health, Centers for Disease Control and other agencies.
The top nutrition researcher at NIH, who focused on studying ultraprocessed foods, left the agency, citing censorship under Kennedy. (HHS previously denied the claims.)
These research cuts and layoffs may make it impossible to enact stricter rules or investigate the food industry, said Dr. Jerold Mande, an adjunct professor at the Harvard School of Public Health and a senior policy official in the Obama and Clinton administrations.
“They’ve also lost tens of thousands of people across government to do these investigations,” he said.
At the same time, some health experts are hopeful Kennedy will seize on political momentum to make major policy changes to improve Americans’ diets.
“I do give RFK Jr. a lot of credit for making chronic disease caused by our food, principally obesity, a political priority,” Mande said. “I give them an incomplete in terms of what they’re going to do about it.”
In August, the MAHA Commission will release the second report on its strategy for improving childhood chronic obesity.
Advocates will be looking to see if the report signals the administration may try to mandate front-of-package warning labels or crack down on marketing junk food to children. The report may also provide clues to whether the administration will create dietary guidelines with recommendations for limits to ultraprocessed foods.
These would be major moves, but they may clash with the administration’s deregulatory agenda.
“People are right to question what the lasting policy change is going to be,” Mande said, noting that removing artificial colors matters only if Kennedy is “laying the groundwork to take on ultraprocessed food broadly.”
CNN’s Kristen Rogers contributed to this article.
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