A new report linking pesticide overuse to children’s health issues has ignited a battle within President Donald Trump’s circle of support, pitting powerful agrichemical giants against some organic food advocates.
Last month, the Make America Healthy Again commission, chaired by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., published a report on declining childhood health metrics. One of the leading culprits, according to the report, was the more than 1 billion pounds of pesticides used annually on the nation’s crops.
“This administration has done something that no other administration has ever done, which is to acknowledge the impact of toxic chemicals and products in our environment and in our society that are contributing to our physical and mental and reproductive health crisis,” said Zen Honeycutt, executive director of Moms Across America, a nonprofit that has called for a ban on dozens of pesticides.
The organization and others like it have mobilized around Kennedy’s Make America Healthy Again campaign. Referred to by some as “MAHA moms,” the coalition of health advocates has become fierce supporters of Trump.
While the MAHA report stated pesticides are commonly found in the bloodstream of America’s children — “some at alarming levels” — Honeycutt wished the report had gone further. She also believes the report downplayed the amount of scientific research already showing links between pesticides and cancer, reproductive health harm and respiratory damage.
“But what gives me hope is what Trump has said and what Kennedy is saying and what the science shows,” Honeycutt said. “If they continue to honor their word … and they acknowledge that pesticides are contributing to human health conditions, then the only steps to be taken will be to at least reduce the exposure of these chemicals to human beings.”
However, Trump is facing opposition to the report from another key constituency — farmers.
“It is deeply troubling for the White House to endorse a report that sows seeds of doubt and fear about our food system and farming practices,” said Zippy Duvall, president of the American Farm Bureau Federation.
Pesticides — used to control weeds and insects — are used by most farmers.
The Farm Bureau and several agrichemical groups said any effort to reduce pesticide use would decrease food production and harm farm income.
“This report will stir unjustified fear and confusion among American consumers, who live in the country with the safest and most abundant food supply,” said Alexandra Dunn, president and CEO of CropLife America, a national organization representing many large agrichemical companies, including Bayer, Corteva Agriscience and Syngenta.
Pesticide companies are in a position to push back on the MAHA report, especially after years of increased spending on federal lobbyists and political donations.
Bayer, the maker of the weedkiller Roundup, has faced an onslaught of lawsuits claiming its glyphosate product is to blame for thousands of cancer cases. In 2020, the company agreed to pay nearly $11 billion to more than 120,000 people who claimed the herbicide caused their cancer.
The company has increased its federal lobbying and political spending in recent years, and has also pushed for state-level laws that would shield it from further lawsuits.
Trump’s campaign and presidency have received millions of dollars in donations from the world’s largest agrichemical companies. The White House did not respond to a question about political contributions and its potential influence.
Trump could further restrict pesticide use on his own
During Trump’s first term, deregulation was a central theme for both his environmental and agriculture agencies. His EPA overturned an Obama-era ban on chlorpyrifos despite science linking the pesticide to numerous childhood health issues.
In his second term, Trump has cut funding for scientific research at numerous agencies, including the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The Environmental Protection Agency is also considering a proposal to prevent states from requiring warning labels on pesticides, including glyphosate.
However, when the MAHA report was released, Kennedy attempted to portray the president as someone willing to further regulate the pesticide industry.
“(Trump is) blamed for giving money to billionaires, we hear about that all the time, but he is on the side of the middle class, the working class, the poor in this country,” Kennedy said at a May 22 MAHA commission meeting as the president sat smiling to his right.
“I’ve met every president since my uncle was president, and I’ve never seen a president (like Trump), Democrat or Republican, that is willing to stand up to industry when it’s the right thing to do.”
George Kimbrell, co-executive director of the Center for Food Safety, which has advocated for stronger pesticide regulations, called the MAHA report a “baby step” in the right direction and acknowledged the tone over pesticide regulations could be shifting.
“Going back my entire career, 20-plus years now of doing this work, it doesn’t matter if it’s a Democratic administration or a Republican administration, they have been beholden to and done the wishes of the pesticide industry,” Kimbrell told Investigate Midwest. “So, this is a unique moment where … there’s a chance that there could be some positive change in terms of responsible oversight for these toxins.”
While some pesticide opponents hope the MAHA report encourages congressional action, Kimbrell said there are several steps within Trump’s control.
The Center for Food Safety, along with several other organizations, has asked the EPA to cancel all registrations of glyphosate herbicide, after the agency failed to demonstrate it can meet the required Federal Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act safety standard.
Dicamba herbicides are banned this year from over-the-top applications, but Monsanto and other companies have asked the EPA to approve them for next year.
“That’s a simple thing the administration can do, just don’t reapprove it,” Kimbrell said.
Pesticide opponents want to see policies and more funding devoted to organic farming practices.
However, the Trump administration has moved to limit farmer resources to organic and climate-smart practices, including the removal of climate data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s website, which organic farmers have relied on. Following a lawsuit by the Northeast Organic Farming Association of New York, the USDA agreed to return the data.
MAHA report spotlights economic challenges in moving beyond pesticides
While spotlighting the dangers of pesticides, the MAHA report also acknowledged that “American farmers rely on these products” and that the economic impact of removing pesticides must be considered.
Honeycutt, with Moms Across America, wondered why the pesticide section of the report was the only one to highlight economic challenges with imposing new policies.
“It is understood that the farming industry needs to be able to operate profitably, but I find it counter to the intent of this report that this is the only section, out of the dozens of contributing factors to health concerns, in which this type of wording is being used,” Honeycutt wrote.
Pesticide opponents note that organic crop sales have quadrupled since 2001, topping $20 billion in 2021, according to the USDA.
Harriet Behar, a farm services consultant for the Organic Farmers Association, said she disagrees with the notion that farmers need pesticides to be profitable.
“We’ve figured out ways to produce high-quality and abundant food without the use of glyphosate,” Behar said.
For 35 years, Behar worked as an organic farm inspector. As she met new organic farmers, she would always ask why they chose to go organic.
“And the farmer would say, ‘My uncle died of cancer, my wife was a breast cancer survivor, my child had leukemia,’ ” Behar said. “They see the connection between the pesticide uses and they just didn’t want to continue, so they went organic.”
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