While the president continues to wage war on Iran, Health Secretary Robert Kennedy Jr. is waging a war on Jell-O.
Kennedy’s Department of Health and Human Services is threatening to withhold millions of dollars from hospitals and nursing homes that serve Jell-O, fruit juice, and other sugary foods or drinks that don’t adhere to new MAHA dietary guidelines established by the Department of Agriculture last year, CBS News reported.
The health secretary has also floated withholding Medicaid and Medicare payments.
To carry out the crackdown, HHS is pushing a kind of community surveillance system, encouraging patients and staffers alike to report alleged violators to the federal government.
“If a hospital is serving patients sugary drinks, they are out of compliance with government standards and are putting their reimbursements in jeopardy,” Calley Means, one of Kennedy’s advisors, wrote on X earlier this month.
“If you see patients being served sugary drinks, please post information below or let CMS know,” Means went on, including a link to an HHS webpage that accepts reported complaints.
Kennedy, a conspiracy theorist with no scientific background, said last month that his agency had notified hospitals nationwide of the new terms.
“We are going to bring all the hospitals in the country in line with good food,” he said, according to CBS, referring to it as “essentially a federal mandate.”
But medical experts and litigators told the outlet the agency may not have the authority to take such a sweeping—and unprecedented—step.
“Most of this is political theater. HHS doesn’t have the power to do much,” Kevin Klatt, a dietitian and research scientist, told the outlet. “Also, if it’s to the point that you’re trying to control people’s choices, well, you look a little fascist.”
The Daily Beast has reached out to HHS for comment. In a statement, agency spokesperson Andrew Nixon walked back the claims, saying the guidance “does not establish new mandates, change Medicare Conditions of Participation, or create any new penalties for hospitals or nursing homes.”
He added that “There are no changes to enforcement, survey, or accreditation processes associated with this guidance.”
Kennedy’s war on Jell-O comes as the White House has effectively muzzled him on his usual vaccine conspiracies and more radical health proposals in the lead-up to the midterms, which are already expected to be difficult for the GOP.
Instead, the 72-year-old has been encouraged to focus on “greenlight” topics, including food quality and fitness, lowering healthcare costs, cracking down on billing fraud, and promoting “gold standard” practices, Bloomberg reported earlier this month.
Even Trump has reportedly soured on Kennedy, viewing his quackish policies as too far. It’s not clear what the president’s take on Jell-O is, but his diet famously centers on fast food.
