Outbreak of failure: Cyclospora shows food safety unraveling under RFK Jr.
Tens of thousands of people got sick this summer from a foodborne illness outbreak that was preventable. In today’s episode, Ken speaks with Sarah Sorscher, director of regulatory affairs for the Center for Science in the Public Interest, about the cyclospora outbreak sweeping the U.S.
The outbreak is a direct symptom of years of underinvestment and recent cuts to public health infrastructure by the Trump administration. From the Centers for Disease Control and Preventions’ shrinking FoodNet surveillance program to the thousands of Food and Drug Administration and Health and Human Services staff lost to layoffs and early retirements, Sarah lays out how the systems meant to catch contamination early have been dismantled.
It’s happening under Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and his unfulfilled Make America Healthy Again promises on food chemicals and a food safety loophole, synthetic dyes and defining "ultra-processed food. And it begs the question: Why are the people who promised to fix the food system are the ones gutting the agencies built to protect it?
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Ken Cook: Hello there. It's Ken Cook, and I'm having another episode. This one I'm genuinely excited about because I get to talk with someone I consider one of the most thoughtful people working in food policy today. Her portfolio spans everything from foodborne illness to food additives, FDA law, MAHA politics.
She's an attorney with a deep background in this space, and she's at one of my favorite organizations, the Center for Science in the Public Interest, also known as CSPI. It's been a favorite of mine for decades, ever since Mike Jacobson founded it and ran it for decades. And really, in a sense, CSPI was a model in some respects for how I decided to build out EWG.
So my guest today is Sarah Sorscher, that aforementioned expert and lobbyist. I'm tickled to have her on. Now, I've been wanting to pick Sarah's brain for a while now about all things Trump, food safety, food health, MAHA, and so forth. We unfortunately have a very timely reason to start talking about foodborne illness.
We're in the middle of a historic Cyclospora outbreak. We're talking explosive diarrhea, tens of thousands of cases, hospitalizations, and even now deaths. Sarah's gonna walk us through why that's not some freak accident. It traces directly back to the hollowing out of the public health infrastructure that's supposed to catch these outbreaks before they spread.
CDC programs like FoodNet quietly being scaled back, so our radar is turned off when we should be having it turned on to see these things coming. Thousands of HH staff gone, let go, fired, early retirement, and so forth. The very system that enabled us to detect contamination early instead of after the damage is underway.
And that connects to the second thread I really want to dig into with Sarah. That's the gap between what MAHA promised on food chemicals and additives and what's actually happening. RFK Jr. made big, bold promises during the campaign and during the transition and during his own campaign to become HHS secretary.
He said he would ban synthetic dyes, closing the loophole that lets companies self-certify new ingredients as safe, defining ultra-processed food, and more. Sarah and CSPI have been tracking all of it, and here's the pattern she's found, and we found the same thing. Pressure campaigns and announcements, Instagram posts, podium speeches standing in for actual regulation.
Corporate pledges instead of enforceable standards. It's a real window into what happens when the rhetoric of reform runs into an administration that, at its core, doesn't believe the government has any business solving these problems in the first place. So Sarah, thanks so much for joining.
Sarah Sorscher: Thank you, Ken.
I really do feel like I'm stepping into this tremendous legacy at CSPI that really truly was one of these core groups that founded the consumer protection movement, and has been behind some of those core consumer protections that shape our food system. And that when I have gone to the grocery store my whole life have really been the beneficiary of.
And I'm excited to stand into this role and really continue the fight for better transparency and safer food, and also to have EWG as a partner in that.
Ken Cook: We're tickled to, to be in the same foxhole on so many issues. And as we've come to learn over the past couple of years- Uh, there were big promises made, you could say boastful promises made about vast changes that were going to unfold in food, food ingredient policy, nutrition policy, and so forth.
And it turns out, who knew? It turns out it's harder than it looks, and no one knows that better than the professionals at, at CSPI. But let's just jump to this current situation, the substantive situation we find ourselves in with respect to foodborne illness, and then how it's being messaged by the administration, which is a big departure To my mind, in how past administrations have talked about how to deal with and what's at stake with cyclospora, with E.
coli, salmonella, and so forth, it's kind of mind-boggling the way this administration's handling that. But you and CSPI have been through many of these episodes in the past. How do you rate what we're going through now in terms of past foodborne illness problems?
Sarah Sorscher: Yeah, I think you're so right about this administration and their really bizarre approach because I think what we're seeing right now from these outbreaks is really the risk of what can happen when we make policy choices not to invest in public health, and actually to disinvest- Yeah
in public health, because all of these outbreaks are preventable with the right investment. And we're really in a strange place right now where we have elected a presidential administration that has platformed RFK Jr., right? Our health secretary, he has adopted this Make America Healthy Again branding that really parrots a lot of the things that groups like my organization, Center for Science in the Public Interest, and your organization, Environmental Working Group, have been saying for years.
That the food system is making us sick, that corporations bear responsibility, and that the government should act to serve the people and provide solutions. And it's almost as if we've been asking for a Superman to come and save the food system, and what we've gotten instead is Bizarro Superman, right?
Yeah. He has the S on his chest. He kind of has the same costuming, and he's saying he wants to be a hero, but everything he does just comes across so twisted that actually he's the villain, right? He's actually hurting people, and he's taking actions that need to be stopped. And I think the core issue is that this administration fundamentally doesn't believe that the government can provide solutions that serve people, and they have really fully embraced this sort of Reagan-era philosophy that government can't help, that actually efforts to solve the problems are the source of the harm.
And so what we're seeing play out this summer in the food safety space is just a hint of what the risk is when we put in place leaders of government who don't believe that government should provide solutions for everyday people.
Ken Cook: Yeah.
Sarah Sorscher: I don't think RFK Jr. really set out to cause outbreaks. Really, no one voted for explosive diarrhea, right?
But that is what we're seeing happen here.
Ken Cook: Yeah. And I remember the Reagan days, and I remember Bush one and Bush two. And it is like that in many ways, with the exception of this is the first administration that has openly said that they want to use their powers to dismantle the administrative state, not to balance economic and health interests or economic and environmental interests, get things oriented more favorably toward industry.
They just wanna get rid of the ability of the government to do its job. That's a very different kettle of fish. It's... I think it's hard for people to get their mind around- that that would actually be the ideology, but it's spelled out in Project 2025 and memos that come out daily from OMB that sometimes I think Kennedy probably, probably blindside him, or if they don't blindside him, he's helpless to deal with because the MAGA agenda, as you say, many things your organization, CSPI, and, and mine, EWG, have stood for and fought for, for decades.
The problem is trying to make that fit inside MAGA.
Sarah Sorscher: Yes. MAHA never really had a natural home inside MAGA And I think people are aware of the fact that right now we're having a massive, unprecedented outbreak of cyclosporiasis, of a, you know, this explosive diarrhea-causing parasite, and it's coming on the heels of a massive, unprecedented attack on public health and public service, that HHS has lost over 18,000 people in the past year through layoffs and resignations and retirements, and it's about 20% of their workforce that they have had cut.
And the management has been sheer chaos, eliminating entire agencies and divisions at the stroke of a button without any thought, impeding daily work, you know, not letting people in the lab buy lab supplies, right? And just making it miserable- to work in government and try to solve problems for people.
I'll never forget April Fool's Day last year, because RFK Jr. chose to announce the mass firings at CDC that day, and he actually terminated the division that houses CDC's Lead Prevention Program. Right. So here's someone who's promised to clean up the food, promised to get toxics out of the food, and the same experts who solved-- Do you remember the big applesauce outbreak?
We had the cinnamon- Yes, of course ... applesauce. Yeah. And it was a supplier in Ecuador who had put lead chromate in the cinnamon spice that he was using. Yeah. So it's, like, really toxic coloring from a foreign supplier. This is, like, exactly the kind of problem that MAHA should've been designed to prevent, and CDC solved that.
They funded a program in North Carolina to go out and interview children and figure out what they ate, and we got the applesauce off the shelves. And RFK Jr. comes in, and he eliminates the division that did that work. And so, you know- we at CSPI worked with other groups to create a letter that elevated this issue, and we had RFK Jr.
questioned at a hearing with Senator Baldwin. Yeah. And eventually they reversed those cuts, but it's very hard to get expertise like that back once they've left an agency. And, you know, we've seen people from that program are still leaving and, you know, these are the systems that help protect us from outbreaks.
And- if you can't detect and solve outbreaks and put in place those preventive measures, then you have nothing, and all of that work is under attack right now.
Ken Cook: Yeah, that's what I think people don't understand, and the, and the administration has been very defensive about it, as if, if you talk about staff cuts or laboratories being closed down or delimited in what they can do, if you point that out, you can be accused of being prone to Trump Derangement Syndrome or not realizing that we can do more with less, which is always a possibility, of course.
It's always good to seek efficiencies, but we're not talking about efficiencies here really. We're, we're talking about pretty much wholesale, uh, loss of scientists e- either through buyouts or reductions in force, that there's no justification for it. It's not targeted in many cases. It's just, it's just done for the sake of, I think, making it harder for the government to, to function.
And so a- as you look at this cyclospora outbreak, what's your sense of where things went wrong so far with the way the administration has reacted? I mean, for a long time, and I think we still see it, that Kennedy and others say it's under control, and I th- I think we're well north of 15,000 confirmed cases just since May, right?
Doesn't seem to be in control. We've had, I think, two deaths have been attributed to it and hundreds of hospitalizations. This is the kind of thing that normally you would see the CDC not saying it's under control, but saying, "We're working on it. This is a problem we're really worried about, you know, Americans who might fall prey to this infection."
What's your sense of how they've handled this particular issue, Sarah?
Sarah Sorscher: Yeah, and I think you're so right that when you try to point to specific cuts that were made, the administration is very defensive, and they'll say, "Oh, you know, we fired 20,000 people, but we didn't fire any scientists," or, "We didn't fire any inspectors," but it turns out they fired the teams that book travel for the inspectors, so they can't actually go out- Right
and visit the sites, right? So these things are all connected. You can't take out one card and expect the house to stand. I think that the FoodNet cuts are a good example of that. FoodNet is a program that tracks foodborne illness trends, and it used to track eight different pathogens, and cyclospora was one of them.
It, it basically helps us get a picture of how we're doing over time. So I'm getting a lot of calls from reporters right now asking me, "Is foodborne illness up this summer? We're seeing a lot of headlines. Is there more illness?" We don't know that without having the system in place to go out and collect that data because the outbreaks don't tell the full story.
It's only a tiny, tiny fraction of illness.
Ken Cook: Right.
Sarah Sorscher: And FoodNet was the system that was set up to do that work. Last summer, they quietly scaled back that program from tracking eight pathogens to only two, salmonella and E. coli, and cyclospora was one of the ones that was cut. Now, there is certainly direct harm from this decision.
You know, FoodNet actually helps us see the impact of some of these other policy changes. And it also helps us know, like if I'm going out to buy lettuce, is it getting riskier or is it just as safe as it always was? Should I change my behavior?
Ken Cook: Yeah.
Sarah Sorscher: But the bigger concern with FoodNet is that you have to think about what was the thing that drove CDC to make those cuts.
And CDC has been very clear about this. It actually wasn't a DOGE decision. It wasn't a decision made by the presidential administration. It was made because CDC knew that state and local health partners that were feeding the data into that system were running out of money, that they were completely overburdened and they didn't have the resources to go out and interview patients and solve outbreaks and also supply data to FoodNet.
And so it was a triage decision and they said, "We could solve outbreaks or we can track long-term trends and we can't do both," so they triaged FoodNet. And so you could say, "Well, those cuts didn't cause this outbreak," and that would be true But it's sort of like saying, "Well, that fever didn't make that patient sick, and so we don't have to worry about it," right?
'Cause it's a symptom of this broader problem. Yeah. And that is that our public health infrastructure is crumbling across the board. And what that means for us is that we're not catching outbreaks like this when they're small. In the cyclospora outbreak, there was actually two waves of cases that spanned several months, and the first wave spiked in mid-June, and the big wave that really drove those numbers up to historic levels started with s- symptoms starting in July.
And if we'd been able to catch that in June and get- that, that lettuce recalled, then we would not have been reaching these record let- setting highs. And that's sort of the, the impact that we can make through early detection, is we can catch outbreaks when they're small. And so when you're seeing big outbreaks, that is a warning sign that the systems to detect and prevent outbreaks are failing.
Ken Cook: And you're so right. It, it is a system. I think most people don't understand what happens, what the CDC, under normal circumstances, would set about doing if they had adequate staff in a situation like this. So even in the best of times s- as it were, people may not understand that, but makes it even harder for people to appreciate what's missing now and how it's straining our ability to keep up with these serious health threats.
It's unfortunate, but I think that level of literacy just isn't there.
Sarah Sorscher: Yeah. And part of the issue is that we've been under-investing in these programs for years.
Ken Cook: Yeah.
Sarah Sorscher: We haven't kept up with rising costs and also advancing science. Climate change is a factor here because cyclospora needs warm conditions to become infectious.
So what we really need is to have greater investment in these programs. Uh, the CDC gets about $74 million a year. It's kind of laughable when you think about all the money that we spend on food and all the cost of foodborne illness and the billions we spend on foodborne illness, that we only spend this amount to detect outbreaks.
We need to essentially double that amount to really start to get a handle on some of these problems, and that investment certainly isn't coming from this administration, and in fact, we've seen tremendous disruption and loss of human resources that is setting us further back.
Ken Cook: I hear, and I know you do too, from scientists and agency staff pretty much every day, and not just FDA and other agencies at HHS, but EPA and USGS and fill in the blank.
It's unprecedented in the scope of the, what I'm, I keep calling dysregulation, going after the ability of the government to do its organic functions, like cutting funds and forcing people out. On a related topic, this whole question of- Food chemicals that kind of, in a way, burst into view f- in a fresh way, I thought was a positive way, at least initially, with Kennedy taking up this issue after he went to a hearing on Capitol Hill.
It was an opportunity to talk about something that wasn't vaccines. That we need to do something about chemical additives, artificial flavors, artificial colors, other things that are put into our food by food companies pretty much at their will. And this really lit a fire under Kennedy, but he had never worked on this issue before.
And the big promises that came out, I know you were hearing the same thing we were hearing, was, "Hey, you know, you're probably not gonna go in on day one and make these changes." And sure enough, he didn't. But how do you see that issue unfold? Because it, it really is an issue that CSPI put on the map, let's face it.
Sarah Sorscher: Yeah. To me, one of the upshots from the work that RFK Jr. is doing on food policy is that you really can't separate food from other forms of public policy. You've probably noticed that RFK Jr. and MAHA are sort of trying to do this sort of victory lap these past few weeks. They had a press conference earlier this month that announced actions on ultra-processed foods, which, you know, by the way, they still haven't defined.
They've talked about defining- but it's not out yet. Secretary Rollins had a press conference on school foods, and it's because they know that food, and especially safe food, is a kitchen table issue for Americans. There's so much support for-
Ken Cook: Totally ...
Sarah Sorscher: reducing consumption of harmful processed foods and increasing consumption of healthy fruits and vegetables and sort of the real foods that we've seen talked about in the food pyramid.
But I think the challenge is, is that you, you really can't separate out food from other public policy. So you can't really deliver a ban on food dyes and then think that people won't care that we're crushing the government food workers union, and we're disbanding and defunding public health programs that prevent outbreaks.
Maybe if we can demonize ultra-processed food, people won't notice that we're cutting food stamps and removing funding for- fruits and vegetable vouchers. When you look at the actual policy that they've created, again, you know, thinking to this frame of, you know, how does MAHA work within MAGA? How does a movement that's supposed to see the government's role as presenting solutions for the food system fit within a very anti-government, anti-regulatory administration?
They have not been successful in delivering even on those policy promises. They did announce a proposal for reforming what's called the grass loophole, which is- A loophole that allows companies, instead of going to FDA and getting approval for new food additives the way that the law re- has required since 1958, they're able to self-certify that because a food is generally recognized as safe, that it is not an additive, and therefore doesn't need pre-market approval.
And this is a loophole that's really grown to swallow the rule, and many, many companies are abusing it to put new substances into foods, some of which are causing their own outbreaks, right? We had an outbreak tied to Tara flour, which was- a substance that never got FDA approval, had never been used in food before anywhere, let alone in the US, and it caused people to lose their gallbladders, literally, and over 400- Yeah
illnesses reported. And they really never found out what was causing that, because it had never been tested for safety, and still hasn't. And FDA struggled for two years before they finally said- "Well, we've done our own independent review and h- not found any data," instead of just being able to say, "You didn't prove that this was safe," and ban it.
So, you know, this has been an ongoing issue for years, and RFK Junior's proposal promised to close this loophole. And instead, what FDA has proposed now is that companies will share their data with FDA, but that FDA won't actually get a chance to independently approve the safety. And so they just sort of have to trust whatever the company does, and if they wanna go take action, they still have to go through that same process of FDA going out and proving that it's not safe, essentially.
And so this really isn't a solution, but it's being presented as one. And even this, it languished for eight months at the White House. Yeah. And now they've got a, I think it's a 120-day comment period. They're really slow-walking this proposal, and it's unlikely actually that even that will be finalized.
And, you know, similarly on food dyes, they promised to ban synthetic dyes. They've been talking about how they have banned synthetic dyes, but really what they've done is put pressure on companies to do that. Pressure that was already there. We've, we've seen a lot of companies over the years promise to remove dyes from products- Yeah
and then not deliver.
Ken Cook: Yeah.
Sarah Sorscher: CSPI actually has a, a tracker on our website that goes through every single corporate pledge that's been made, and the ones that haven't been made. And it's the biggest users of dyes haven't made those pledges. And we've also shown how they, they promised in the past to do it and haven't done it, and we're tracking to see if they deliver on those promises.
But really what you need is regulation to make those steps happen. Yeah. In Europe, they have a warning label for most of these synthetic dyes that are associated with behavioral risks in children. And that's the kind of permanent policy that can make lasting change versus these sort of pressure campaigns and announcements and rhetoric that are not really delivering the results that they promised.
Ken Cook: We hear all the time from people, "Well, isn't it great that these things have been banned just like Bobby promised?" And we're at pains to point out that never did he go on the stump and give a campaign speech where he said, "If Trump's elected and I'm made HHS secretary, I'll have meetings with food companies."
This was not what got the audience on their feet cheering. It was the, the obvious suggestion, and sometimes more than the suggestion, a promise that he was gonna regulate them. He was just gonna push through and defeat this food industry that your organization, my organization's been up against many times.
They are not to be taken on lightly, but neither EWG nor CSPI has ever hesitated to do it. But it's harder than it looks. It's not about some Instagram posts. It's not about some YouTube videos. You have to know that these food companies are lawyered up to the keister, no offense to the lawyer on the call-
and they're ready to, to sue at the drop of a hat to slow things down. And I think in anticipation of that, you're seeing the slow walking of GRAS, and who knows what will happen with the definition of ultra-processed food. I don't remember a time when an agency sent a white paper, not a proposed regulation, but a white paper to OMB for review.
Isn't that sort of like a step below actual activity?
Sarah Sorscher: Yeah, this is very bizarre. Usually, when agencies take action, they regulate, they require. Mm-hmm. And in this case, FDA does have authority over food labels. It can do things like regulate when companies can use terms like non-ultra-processed on their labels, and they can also issue guidance to industry.
One of the things they've done is ask companies to reduce their sodium levels in products, because this can have a huge public health impact, and they did that- through guidance. This is a white paper, and that does two things. One, it means that they're clearly not interested in regulating using this definition, and they're relying on other policymakers to take it up, so potentially state lawmakers or incorporating it into USDA standards for school meals, for example.
But the other thing it means is that we won't have an opportunity to comment on the definition.
Ken Cook: Right.
Sarah Sorscher: Right. Because regulation and guidance is a democratic process. It allows the public to weigh in, and a white paper does not. And so that's very concerning that they're taking that route. If there's something wrong with that proposal, it could then get baked into other policies without really an opportunity for the public to weigh in on that.
Ken Cook: Yeah, I mean, let, let's hope at a minimum they come out of that OMB review process, whatever that is, and come back and propose a f- through formal proposed regulation a definition of ultra-processed food. But that's not guaranteed.
Sarah Sorscher: Yeah, and they have done that. You know, they defined the term healthy-
Ken Cook: Yeah
Sarah Sorscher: through regulation. And that was a really robust process. They made lots of changes, and I think that the same opportunity could be had here.
Ken Cook: Yeah. Let's hope we get that opportunity, because otherwise we're, despite all the victory laps, we're still looking at a pretty meager set of actual regulatory steps by the Food and Drug Administration to deal with these issues that were front and center during the campaign for Kennedy.
Sarah Sorscher: Yeah.
Ken Cook: I mean, this was, this was the big deal, right?
Sarah Sorscher: Yeah. And I think both the white paper and this flawed GRAS proposal really illustrate how much of a, a gap RFK Jr. and this administration are leaving at the federal level. They're relying, and we're relying, on state governments and policymakers to step in and fill those gaps, and we are seeing that now.
We saw a definition of ultra-processed foods created in California for school meals, and really looking to target the most harmful types of ultra- processed foods within that category, which I think is really valuable because we know some things can kind of slip into the definition where we have some questions about whether they're really harmful.
On GRAS reform, New York has now passed, the legislature has passed the Food Safety and Chemical Disclosure Act, which would actually require food companies to publicly disclose when they have self-affirmed GRAS. Now, the FDA rule says it's requiring companies to do that, but they actually have no way to enforce that.
They just sort of wave their hands and say, "You know, if you don't submit, maybe we'll think about some kind of post-market reassessment on you." With New York, you cannot sell that product in New York if it does not have a safety review that's on record with the New York State Department of Agriculture.
So that bill now is headed to Governor Hochul for signature. That would be a really significant milestone in this GRAS reform effort, and bring the food industry to the table in a way that they have not been. They have not been willing to collaborate or think about workable federal reform here, and I think having these states taking action is really vital to that effort.
Ken Cook: No, I couldn't agree more. And, you know, we're very active in a lot of these state arenas.
Sarah Sorscher: I will mention, yes, Scott Faber of EWG was extremely- active in helping to get that California UPF definition passed, and EWG has been a big supporter of the New York GRAS reform bill. Yeah. And, you know, CSPI also has a bill in California as well that we're hoping to partner with other groups on that would fully close the GRAS loophole.
It would actually require companies to go to FDA and get that review for their GRAS notices in a way that essentially solves the problem through state policy.
Ken Cook: It's interesting because EWG, like CSPI, we style ourselves as national organizations. Our focus has been the federal government to try and get things done at that level.
I assume CSPI, and I know EWG, has worked at the state level nonetheless. But now it seems like it's, I won't say the only avenue, but it's, it's pretty close to the only avenue that feels like we can play offense, right? And then with that, of course, industry's noticing. Looking at the hundreds of cases where the food industry has sued Governments for trying to do things about food safety.
Everything from identifying ultra-processed foods to package labeling. All kinds of progressive reforms to give people a fighting chance for a better food environment where they can inform themselves and make decisions. So they've su- hundreds of lawsuits brought by f- the food industry around the globe about that.
And then there's the overt effort in Washington now. I think this is the politics of our age now. It's the politics, it's the political economy of preemption, right? Where a progressive effort, it can be a, a progressive effort in a city or a county that a conservative state legislature tries to preempt.
Or in this case, we have all these state food policy laws advancing. A lot of support from local MAHA-identified citizens and groups and individuals supportive of it, which it's welcome because Republicans didn't necessarily take this tack. They certainly didn't when Michelle Obama was pushing it, but they're doing it now.
But the reaction from the food industry is to go to Washington and say, "Hey, we're all about states' rights unless it intrudes on our ability to freely put into food and manage the food system the way we see fit. And as long as we have a nice tame Food and Drug Administration, nice tame USDA, we're fine.
But these states, they're out of control. It's a patchwork of policies that we can't possibly pursue commerce if they aren't preempted and if federal law doesn't smush all of these state authorities. Is that how you see it?
Sarah Sorscher: No, I do not. I see it more as Scott Faber says. Uh, Scott Faber is the vice president for government affairs for Environmental Working Group, your organization.
Yeah. He's been a real champion on this issue of preemption. It's not a patchwork, it's a warm quilt. Yeah. And I think as a consumer movement, we've really made the mistake of actually being too focused at the federal level. I mean, I think FDA- and USDA are amazing agencies and, and they have amazing potential, right, to be really steeped in the science and make science-based decisions.
But the core of the consumer movement has always rested with the states. Yeah. And if you go back to the 1880s, you know, the rise of the pure food and drug movement and the original food standards, these were state policies. Yeah. And a lot of our food safety inspection, our restaurant inspection, our retailer inspection, even like pasteurized milk laws, these are all state laws.
Yeah. You know, FDA has a role in coordinating and developing models, but it's the states who implement, and that has always been the case. And so preemption is extraordinarily dangerous. And so, by the way, preemption, for those listeners who aren't familiar, what it means is that if you have a state or if you have the federal government, they can step in and say, "Our law is the supreme law of the land.
And so if we're gonna write into our law that all of these state laws are rendered null and void, then our law saying they're null and void takes precedence over the state laws saying that they exist", right? That's essentially the principle.
Ken Cook: Yeah. It's a higher level of government stamping out the authority of a lower.
Sarah Sorscher: Exactly. It's about control and and supremacy. Actually, people think that that means there's gonna be a federal law to replace it, but that's not always the case. We worked with the Harvard Food Law and Policy Clinic to really map out- all of the different ways that states engage in food safety. And it's not just additives approval and warning labels- Right
but it's also these things like restaurant inspection and cottage food regulation. And that really paints a really stark picture of what it would mean to really say, "Oh, the federal government is the only regulator of our food." And it would be a really dark picture, and one that even, I think, food company executives aren't ready to sit down to the table and eat the food that's created under that kind of system.
And I- I'm hoping that when they see this memo, they might have a little moment of pause on the lobbying that they've been doing. We absolutely need to oppose preemption. Really, what would be the thing to address all the state laws would be to have a workable FDA. Because- I'm sure you've talked to the state legislatures.
I have. They don't actually want to be going out- No ... and developing these policies. They're only doing it because they see that FDA banned Red 3 from lipstick in 1990, and it... they're still allowing it in marshmallow Peeps that our kids eat, right? I mean, it's just these kinds of failures-
Ken Cook: Sarah: that are causing them to feel like they have to step in.
And if there was a strong FDA taking action with food companies- supporting them, actually- t- doing meaningful regulation, then we wouldn't have any more state policies. The focus would be on what FDA is doing.
Ken Cook: That's exactly right, and this really bears watching. The federal proposal that we're worried about, the preemption proposal sponsored by the food industry, is called the FRESH Act, Fresh and Affordable Foods.
You know, it's being pushed by the, as you might imagine, the big food companies-
Sarah Sorscher: Yes ...
Ken Cook: to preempt all of these state laws. And it's not just on additives and colorants. It's a wide range of things that would be preempted. And I would strongly encourage folks To take a look at what might be happening in their own state, the battles that might be playing out, including in some very red and purple and, of course, blue states.
It's encouraging that people are paying attention to this issue now. But get involved there and support efforts to pass strong, workable state laws that take these things on, and that'll put pressure on the FDA. And if FDA doesn't respond, then you'll have a framework in place, a warm quilt.
Sarah Sorscher: A warm quilt of protection.
Ken Cook: Yeah. Yeah, that's right, for those chilly nights when, um, there's no protection coming from Uncle Sam.
Sarah Sorscher: That's right.
Ken Cook: So let me just ask you, you've been so generous with your time, and I really am, Sarah, I'm tickled to have a chance to visit with you. I follow you on LinkedIn, and I admire your perspective on so many issues.
But if you were to step back and look at the past year and a half or so, what things stand out for you where we've either made progress or experienced setbacks? I'll throw in a, a bonus question. How is it then that when Michelle Obama was saying many of these same things, there was such a harsh reaction, especially from Republicans, about the nanny state, tell people what to eat, dictate to people what to eat.
But now Kennedy's railing against food companies and saying we need to make all these dramatic changes, not making them, but saying it, he gets a pass.
Sarah Sorscher: Yeah. You know, I thought you were gonna ask me about my origin story 'cause you sometimes ask your guests how they got into this- Yes, I do ... field. Yeah,
Ken Cook: yeah, yeah.
Go for
Sarah Sorscher: it. So I was reflecting- Go for it ... on it, and I came into policy work through my, my dad, who is an engineer at Boeing, and it was conversations around the dinner table with him talking through what happened to his company, right? Because they were-
Ken Cook: Sarah: really focused- on quality and delivering the best possible airplanes.
It was sort of a engineer's collective that was putting quality first. They bought McDonnell Douglas, and they brought on the leadership of McDonnell Douglas, and it really changed the corporate culture at Boeing to follow a model which I think has become the model for corporate governance in the United States writ large, which is that we need to prioritize short-term shareholder value and profit that drives that- Yeah
as the paramount value. And, you know, when you think about sort of you ask the everyday person, you know, "What matters to you? Is it your retirement portfolio?" They'll say, "No, you know, my retirement portfolio is something I use to serve other things. I use it to support family and community and health and wellbeing."
And the way we organize our corporate structure is the opposite. You know, if you're gonna support health for your customers or security for your workers or sustainability for the planet, that has to be done in service of boosting shareholder value, and it's almost a moral imperative now. And it wasn't like that in the past.
Like, when my dad was growing up, we didn't have that sense that morally you had to serve the shareholder and that it had to be the paramount value. And so thinking again about this philosophy of deregulation, it's really set us up for the problems that we have today. And so I wanted to really create policies that would reshape this system.
And I went to law school, and I entered this career in consumer protection with the idea of, you know, policy being a tool to reassert those human values and uplift those human values over this overall system that prioritizes profit And I see government as a solution for that. We're seeing now, what we're seeing this summer with the outbreak headlines is sort of the fallout from that.
And, you know, in some cases, you know, with Boeing, for example, w- we had airplanes literally falling from the sky-
Ken Cook: Yeah, yeah ...
Sarah Sorscher: as a result of that policy. We had the 787 MAX crashes. Yeah,
Ken Cook: terrible.
Sarah Sorscher: People died as a result of that culture that prioritizes profit over quality and safety. And we do have the power to reverse that.
You know, I was born in 1982. You remember the Reagan era, I don't. But it wasn't that long ago. No,
Ken Cook: no.
Sarah Sorscher: And we had this culture shift, and we could shift back our culture around corporate power and corporate responsibility. But we need political leaders who understand that, and they see their role as standing up to corporate influence and really delivering on a government that people are really proud of.
And I, I do think that that is what Michelle Obama was trying to do with her food policy. Yeah,
Ken Cook: for sure.
Sarah Sorscher: And I think we've sort of lost that, and I, I think with this administration, you know, they were willing to criticize Michelle Obama. They're still criticizing government as a solution to problems. Yeah.
And that is why they're not delivering on what we need here, which is the ability to use the democratic process to support our values. It's those smarter policies that are coming, really bubbling up- now from the states. One really core component of food system reform and food safety right now that people could support is this grass reform proposal- Yeah
in New York State, the Food Safety and Chemical Disclosure Act. And you can become a part of that by, I'm sure, signing up to EWG's- email list, but also Center for Science in the Public Interest. Yeah, of course. We have really been leading on the grass reform proposal in New York and in California.
We've seen New York City pass legislatively the Sweet Truth Act, which is a bill that requires high-sugar warnings on restaurant menus. Yeah. And other states are considering that, and of course, the food industry is pushing back, and in- instead of having warnings on high-sugar items, they wanna have a QR code so you can scan the menu with your phone and then see the warnings, which is completely ludicrous.
Yeah. And we need popular pressure to push back on those policies. And we ultimately need to recognize that we do have this power, and it really starts in our own communities at the state and local level. So I think, you know, the thing that gives me hope is exactly what you said, that people are going out and they're making change in their communities, and we need to continue to do that.
Ken Cook: Yeah. So wherever you may be, there's nothing wrong with focusing on what's happening in Washington, nothing wrong with keeping up and reaching your own conclusions about whether we're making progress anywhere near what was promised when MAHA was riding high, which it no longer is, let's be honest. But don't give up on the challenge of making our system better in just the way you've described, Sarah, just because it's not happening in DC.
There's plenty of opportunities locally and certainly in your state capital to get out there and, and make the case. And people are doing it. You don't have to be a super trained lawyer or scientist. There's plenty of help around to help shape ideas and shape legislation, and let's make it happen and demonstrate to the food industry that there really is a, a popular demand to do things differently, to do things better. We've known how to do it for a long time. We need to make that real now. And, uh, preempting it at the federal level by the food industry's, uh, proposed law, no, thank you.
Sarah Sorscher: No, thank you. Absolutely.
Ken Cook: Sarah, thank you so much for joining. I really appreciate it. We're gonna have you back to talk about this issue and others. And again, my hat's off to you, and also CSPI. The public interest could not be better served than we are by your work and the work of the Center for Science in the Public Interest.
Sarah Sorscher: Thank you, Ken. Likewise back at ya.
Ken Cook: Thank you so much for listening. If you'd like to learn more, be sure to check out our show notes for additional links to take a deeper dive into today's discussion.
Make sure to follow our show on Instagram at KenCooksPodcast. And if you're interested in learning more about EWG, head on over to EWG.org or check out the EWG Instagram account at Environmental Working Group. Now, if this episode resonated with you or you think someone you know would benefit from it, please send it along.
The best way to make positive change is to start as a community with your community. Today's episode was produced by the extraordinary Beth Rowe and Mary Kelly. Our show's theme music is by Moby. Thank you, Moby. And thanks again to all of you for listening.