Ag Policy Blog

WASHINGTON (DTN) -- Calley Means, a White House adviser to President Trump, told Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) followers on Tuesday they should criticize the "deep state" in agriculture and food, not Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. or President Donald Trump.

"We must understand the deep state is real," Means said at a Heritage Foundation conference titled The Future of Farming: Exploring a Pro-Health, Pro-Farmer Agenda. "I would suggest we don't attack Secretary Kennedy and President Trump. They are fighting against the deep state. They are our warriors, and we need to turn our attention and fire on the deep state."

While the Heritage Foundation drove the Project 2025 agenda, the conference Tuesday embraced using policies to reshape how farmers raise their crops and livestock. The event highlighted how regenerative agriculture and consumer technology can change food production practices nationally.

Means did not define the deep state, but it was an apparent reference to the agricultural establishment that defends ultra-processed foods and the use of genetically modified seeds as well as pesticides to protect crops from weeds and plant diseases.

Means said he feels "there is something right, something spiritual about MAHA being attached to MAGA (Make America Great Again). History changes when political coalitions change."

"We need to keep this coalition together," Means continued. It will be important for MAHA voters to turn out in the 2026 elections to show "we care about what is happening," he said.

Means listed what he considers MAHA victories -- states moving to ban soda purchases under the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), reforming the Food and Drug Administration's "generally recognized as safe" (GRAS) program, "transformative" dietary guidelines and the pledge that FDA will establish front-of-pack food labeling this year -- but he acknowledged there is "obvious visceral frustration with the MAHA base."

"We have to understand this is a long-term fight," he said. Attendees should "keep hope alive" and engage in a "messy, robust debate," he added.

The MAHA movement is "cultural," he said, but it "runs through politics."

Americans need to realize the United States spends more on health care than any other country, but people in some other countries live an average of seven or eight years longer, he said.

MAHA NEEDS FARMERS

Family farmers, Means said, "are getting kicked and degraded" but "they are the key to solving the health crisis."

In what may have been a veiled reference to the contents of the Make American Healthy Again recommendations report expected to be released soon, Means said MAHA cannot win if everyone in production agriculture becomes an enemy.

"We have to understand we're up against very, very powerful forces, and I have empathy for that," Means said.

Means added, "We need to build bridges. And particularly, I think this is true with agriculture. We are not going to win if the soybean farmers and the corn growers are our enemy. We need to have empathy for people in the agriculture community and understand that we are all aligned on this 10-year vision where the American farmer is held up as the foremost important person in our health care system, and that our soil and that our food is respected."

REGENERATIVE FARMERS

The Heritage Foundation event also included a panel of three prominent farmers who said they had all moved away from conventional agriculture that relies on genetically modified seeds and chemical crop protection toward regenerative agriculture, even though that term is not fully defined. Among them were Joel Salatin, a Virginia livestock producer, who said he is not organic-certified because he engages in certain practices that do not meet Agriculture Department rules, but that the way he farms allows him to be "more ecological and profitable."

Salatin was considered a potential agricultural adviser in the Trump administration, but said he was too much of a "lightning rod," to bring in. Salatin describes himself as a "Christian libertarian environmentalist capitalist lunatic farmer."

Salatin called for "a food emancipation proclamation so farmers can sell to their neighbors without asking the government's permission. You shouldn't have to ask the government's permission to sell a bowl of tomato soup."

While at an event that discussed reshaping agriculture to reduce crop-protection tools, Salatin nonetheless also championed reducing regulation, which he said would allow entrepreneurs to accomplish what Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., wants to accomplish -- "to stop the oligarchy," Salatin said. The remark got the biggest round of applause at the conference.

NEXT MAHA REPORT

The first MAHA Commission report described glyphosate, atrazine and other crop protection products as dangerous to children's health, but over the past month the White House has held meetings with farm leaders.

Last week, Trump administration officials said farmers should not fear recommendations in the second report. On Monday, White House officials said the latest report was to be delivered to Trump on Tuesday but released on a later day when several officials would be available for the unveiling.

"We have lost touch with what is happening to our soil," Means said. The trillions of dollars spent on health care should be shifted to addressing "the root cause of what is making us sick."

Means said restricting sales of soda under SNAP was an easy victory because "it's hard to argue soda is good for kids," but after that the goals get harder.

Means said his "gut" tells him "there is real power in school lunches and other areas where the government spends money."

The MAHA movement has to "work toward cultural change" because this is a fight for civilization, he said.

MAHA LEADERS URGE TRUMP TO OPPOSE PESTICIDE IMMUNITY

Separately, more than 240 leaders and organizations in the Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) movement on Monday sent President Trump a letter urging him to oppose liability immunity for chemicals and pesticides in the House version of the fiscal year 2026 Interior appropriations bill.

"Republicans must do more than ride the wave of MAHA's high polling," said David Murphy, founder of United We Eat, a fundraising organization for the presidential campaign of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who later endorsed Donald Trump for president and is now the Health and Human Services secretary. "President Trump must stand firm and follow through with real policy that protects American health, including opposing chemical liability shields and the Eats Act that put our children at risk and trample Americans' constitutional right to sue."

Charles Eisenstein, who served as chief speechwriter for Kennedy's presidential campaign, said, "There is no constituency within MAHA for pesticide residues, microplastics, or municipal sludge in our food supply. If Republicans want to retain MAHA support long-term, they need to stop siding with agrochemical companies and take leadership on these issues."

DTN Ag Policy Editor Chris Clayton contributed to this report.

Jerry Hagstrom can be reached at jhagstrom@nationaljournal.com

Follow him on social platform X @hagstromreport

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