Food System

The Food System hub tracks the policy fight over what ends up on American plates: ultra-processed foods, petroleum-based dyes, food additives, SNAP eligibility rules, school-meal standards, and federal dietary guidelines. The MAHA coalition has placed food at the center of its theory of why chronic disease has risen, arguing that environmental drivers in the food supply matter as much as individual diet choices. That framing has put HHS, FDA, and USDA into closer coordination on food policy than they have been in decades.

Current activity is concentrated in three areas. The April 2025 HHS and FDA announcement of a phased withdrawal of eight petroleum-based synthetic dyes is the highest-profile move so far, structured as voluntary cooperation with industry rather than an outright regulatory ban. The 2025 to 2030 Dietary Guidelines for Americans, released in January 2026, addressed ultra-processed foods explicitly for the first time. SNAP eligibility and school-meal funding have become congressional flashpoints as the FY 2027 budget moved through committee, with proposals on both sides of the aisle.

From the roster, Calley Means sits inside HHS as senior advisor on food and nutrition policy and has been the public face of the MAHA dietary-guidelines posture. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has been the political driver of the food-additives announcements. Mark Hyman, Max Lugavere, and Vani Hari are the most-cited movement voices on ultra-processed foods, each from a different angle: clinical, journalistic, and consumer-advocacy. We track their public statements as they intersect with policy moves at HHS and FDA.