President-elect Donald Trump wants Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to play a major role in U.S. food policy as head of the Department of Health and Human Services. Some farmers and agriculture experts worry that Kennedy will push unscientific and unproven ideas.President-elect Donald Trump won farm country by wide margins in this month's election, with rural voters helping fuel his return to the White House.
"He has gone as far as saying he would 'weaponize' regulatory agencies to eliminate the use of pesticides," Zaluckyj said, adding that Kennedy has"voiced strong opposition to the scientific consensus" on farm industry practices. Some agriculture experts worry similar unproven or unscientific views could now reshape U.S. farm and food policy.
Kennedy has long condemned industrial food corporations as well as Big Ag trade groups, which he says have driven an obesity epidemic in the U.S. while polluting farmland and bankrupting smaller family farms.on a host of food additives and dyes. He wants to reduce the dominance of ultra-processed foods; he's called for reforming the SNAP food assistance program — formerly known as food stamps.