MAHA Revolts Against RFK Jr. for Broken Promise

Trumpland admin June 17, 2026 0 Comments

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is at risk of losing support from the movement that put him in power.

In yet another blow to the health secretary’s “Make America Healthy Again” (MAHA) movement, lobbying groups have poured millions into fighting Kennedy’s ability to clean up food—and it appears to be working.

Lobbyists have taken aim at Kennedy’s stated goal of closing the “GRAS” loophole. A GRAS, or “generally recognized as safe,” designation allows companies to bring products to market more quickly without formal FDA review, NOTUS reported Wednesday. MAHA activists are almost universally opposed to GRAS, which they argue allows untested ingredients into the food supply.

But while Kennedy, 72, has preemptively declared victory against GRAS, the food industry has nearly tripled its D.C. lobbying efforts, NOTUS reported.

Companies including Nestlé, PepsiCo, Coca-Cola, and Keurig Dr Pepper are taking up arms against the reform and rallying behind legislation from Florida Republican Kat Cammack that would narrow the loophole—but not close it. Instead, foods that have been declared GRAS could still enter the market without FDA approval, while the agency could retroactively approve ingredients.

That won’t be enough for MAHA.

“We don’t need those chemicals in the food supply,” MAHA activist Zen Honeycutt, the founder of the group Moms Across America, told NOTUS.

What’s more, last month, the FDA quietly tweaked its website to say it would fulfill its promises by the end of 2027—a full year after Kennedy said his reforms would be in place.

“We are concerned we are going to see not a big swing but some smaller incremental change,” Thomas Galligan, the principal scientist for food additives and supplements at the Center for Science in the Public Interest, told NOTUS.

When asked about his promise to close the GRAS loophole, Kennedy merely quipped, “Stand by,” according to the outlet.

The Daily Beast has reached out to the FDA for comment.

This isn’t the first time the Kennedy scion has seemingly turned his back on his base. In February, MAHA erupted in anger after President Donald Trump issued an executive order promoting the use of glyphosate, a widely used weedkiller. Kennedy and his base have long argued that the chemical is dangerous and have backed thousands of lawsuits involving Roundup, an herbicide originally manufactured by Monsanto.

Kennedy, a lawyer, has argued that Monsanto knew glyphosate caused cancer—and helped secure a $289 million jury verdict against the company in 2018, according to The New York Times.

“The herbicide Glyphosate is one of the likely culprits in America’s chronic disease epidemic. Much more widely used here than in Europe,” Kennedy wrote on X in June 2024, while he was campaigning for president.

In April, Politico reported that a third of Americans now identify as MAHA. At the same time, roughly half of the group told pollsters they don’t believe Trump and Kennedy have accomplished enough of their promised agenda.