As a doctor by training, it’s perhaps not surprising that Sen. Roger Marshall, R-KS, has enthusiastically endorsed the “Make America Healthy Again” movement launched by new Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Along with Sens. Tommy Tuberville, R-AL., Rick Scott, R-FL, Cynthia Lummis, R-WY, and Ron Johnson, R-WI, he’s formed a “MAHA” caucus.
Marshall says this effort is important because 60% of Americans have a chronic disease, 20% of children are on a prescription drug, and perhaps 40% of adolescents are morbidly obese or pre-diabetic.
“Recognizing the chronic health problems we have is up front for Bobby and myself,” he told Agri-Pulse during an exclusive interview. “Both of us think that food is medicine and there’s a great opportunity for preventing these diseases by making healthy choices, eating more nutrient dense foods and decreasing the toxins our bodies are exposed to.”
Marshall described Kennedy and his team as “friends, colleagues” where there is “total trust” between each other.
“They call and text me on a regular basis. I’m involved in the direction of their executive orders. Many of them are physicians, so that’s an easy relationship to build upon,” he added.
“Look, Bobby Kennedy and I don’t agree on some major, major political issues out there, but we both agree that we want to make America healthy again.” Marshall said he wants to “bring agriculture’s voice to the table” along with Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins and others.
What does that mean for the farmers and ranchers who have steadily increased productivity while using fewer chemicals and fertilizers? Marshall says his group is trying to take the current conservation and precision agriculture practices of the American farmer and amplify those in various ways.
“American agriculture is already doing the things that MAHA moms are calling for” he said. But at the same time, “there is still a lot of work to do.”
“At the end of the day, I think we’re after nutrient rich food, and soil health equates with healthy nutrients, too. And yes, we want them with less toxins in them. We want to want them with less pesticides, with less fertilizer, those types of things as well. That’s kind of the big theme here.”
RFK Jr. frequently positions organic foods, which are grown with different types of pesticides and fertilizers than conventional crops and typically require a three-year transition term, to be healthier and more desirable. When asked if the MAHA goal was to move all producers 100% organic, Marshall suggested it was more about using fewer inputs.
“I think that organic is a way overused term, and it means so many different things to different people. We’re already doing a lot of organic practices. We need to just amplify them,” he added, while describing practices like crop rotation, cover crops and using livestock manure as fertilizer.
“Through precision agriculture, we’re able to use less fertilizers and less pesticides. We’re already doing that, and we can do more of it as well as embrace some natural opportunities.”
One of the best ways to encourage those types of changes is to create market opportunities that generate more revenue, Marshall said. He’s tried to educate MAHA supporters that farmers respond to markets. For example, if more Americans wanted grass fed beef, ranchers would deliver.
However, he pointed out that some types of production may be more expensive and that conflicts with President Donald Trump’s goal to bring grocery prices down, he added. If some of the MAHA proposals are inflationary, Marshall said they probably won’t work or may require some additional incentives in a farm bill.
For example, Marshall said fertilizers used today work well. If farmers were to substitute some of these with something more natural it may increase spending for farmers.
Marshall also suggested farmers need to more frequently “tell the story” about some of the regenerative practices that were embraced decades ago like no-till farming. For example, the most recent Census data indicates American farmers added more than 756,000 acres to no-tillage production since the 2017 census. In 2022, more than 105.2 million acres were in no-till production, compared to more than 104.45 million acres in 2017.
Seed oil science
What about foods that RFK Jr. has criticized such as “seed oils,” some of which come from the over 4 million acres of soybean fields planted in the state of Kansas last year and over 86 million acres nationally.
“Bobby Kennedy’s two first goals coming into coming into his position, are radical transparency and gold standard research,” Marshall explained. “There’s lots of data that the NIH and CDC have chosen not to share through biased reasons. If the data is there, let Americans see it.”
However, Marshall said, “I’m not close to saying that seed oils are bad, I think we truly don’t know whether they’re good or bad, and we need to hone into that and have somebody study it.”
Overall, Marshall said, “we need to dispel the myths.” He says the caucus will lead the fight for getting whole milk back into schools, introduce several other MAHA-related bills and also work to pause and redo the dietary guidelines.
“I’m really careful not to be overly prescriptive, whether it’s on how to farm or what a good, nutritious diet looks like,” he added. “I think we need to set guardrails and give people good information.”
Editor’s note: Sara Wyant is publisher of Agri-Pulse Communications, Inc., www.Agri-Pulse.com.
