White House healthy eating push contradicts program cut, expert says
The Trump administration eliminated a landmark nutrition education program for recipients of federal food assistance and other low-income people as part of a sweeping spending and tax law signed last summer, and the program will cease to exist within weeks, according to NPR.
The cut comes as the White House simultaneously promotes the Make America Healthy Again initiative, which is focused on decreasing consumption of ultraprocessed foods and encouraging Americans to eat more fruits and vegetables.
Tashara Leak, a professor of nutritional sciences at Cornell University, said the elimination contradicts the administration’s stated health goals. “It doesn’t make sense when we have an administration [promoting] the Make America Healthy Again efforts that are focused on decreasing consumption of ultraprocessed foods and wanting to encourage people to eat more fruits and vegetables,” Leak said, “to then get rid of the largest federally-funded nutrition education program that helps to achieve those goals.”