Make America Healthy.
Some thoughts on the MAHA movement
Housekeeping: I am no longer keeping a regular schedule for Wrap posts but intend to share Wrap #20 before May. I plan to turn my attention to making more spontaneous posts moving forward, like what follows…
What is MAHA?
Make America Healthy Again, also known as the MAHA movement, is an interesting sideshow to the rest of President Trump’s political movement. It’s largely a result of RFK Jr’s endorsement of and teaming-up with Trump, but the MAHA movement has a longer history, which I still haven’t figured out.
Believe it or not, the phrase was actually born out of a short-lived marketing campaign started by Sweet Green (the fast-casual franchise restaurant) when they removed bacon and sriracha from their menu in 2016. (This move was not very well-received by their bacon and sriracha loving customers; check out the comments on their Facebook post from 2016.) At that time, Sweet Green choosing to use the phrase Make America Healthy Again was an obvious act of political rebellion by the brand in the midst of Trump’s political rise to prominence that year. This is pretty ironic considering the phrase has now been embraced by the MAGA political movement.
After this seemingly short lived marketing campaign by Sweet Green, usage of the phrase went dormant until the doctor and author Nicole Saphier used it as the title of her 2020 book Make America Healthy Again: How Bad Behavior and Big Government Caused a Trillion-Dollar Crisis. The phrase already had a political connotation, but this seems to be the beginning of the phrase moving from the left to the right. I could be wrong about that, but it’s difficult for me not to assume that Saphier played a role in that shift because she’s now a regular contributor to Fox News and based on her Twitter/X profile a clear supporter of Republican politics (and she sells questionable supplements, which destroys her credibility in my opinion). Regardless, the MAHA movement is now clearly a subpart of the larger MAGA movement. The MAHA Super PAC spent over $4.3M to support Trump in the aftermath of RFK’s endorsement of him.
Besides RFK Jr. and Dr. Saphier, leaders of the MAHA coalition include TrueMed co-founder Calley Means–who helped facilitate the RFK-Trump alliance–and his sister Dr. Casey Means, other non-practicing physicians, like Dr. Robert Malone and Dr. Jay Bhattacharya (newly appointed Director of the NIH), Ways2Well founder Brigham Buhler, Joe Rogan is certainly an advocate (perhaps not a leader), and a legion of “MAHA Mamas,” chief among them “Food Babe” Vani Hari.
Why is MAHA a right-wing coalition?
The complete answer to this question alludes me, but it seems not to be the fault completely of the right nor of the left.
As the movement currently exists, the fact that it is primarily led by RFK, whose views on vaccines are clearly flawed, does not help attract liberals, who tend to be more staunch supporters of vaccines. This is part of a larger trend I’ve noticed, which is that the MAHA movement seems to generally be more skeptical of science and scientific institutions. I’m not saying that this is without reason. There are definitely a lot of things to be skeptical of when it comes to the influences that major corporations have on research and regulatory bodies like the FDA and USDA. But Democrats tend to be more trusting of these institutions.
My Take on MAHA
I honestly don’t have a problem with “Make American Healthy Again” being a political movement. Societal health is certainly a topic worthy of political attention. But I do have an issue with it being a partisan issue. If this doesn’t change, I think the MAHA movement will fail to have the most positive impact that it could and it could even have a negative impact. However, I think it is responsibility of educated liberals who work in healthcare and medicine who really understand these issues to bring about a bipartisan transformation of this movement. I bet there are thousands of influential, politically active liberal doctors and scientists who agree with many of the valid concerns that leaders of the MAHA movement bring up. I also bet that most of them don’t dare engage with the movement in anyway other than to criticize it because of the vaccine skepticism that it harbors.
There’s no good reason to disagree with the fact that America could be healthier. To deny the that the US has an alarming obesity problem, or that our food environment is filled with junk food is to be in denial. As MAHA professes, most of our chronic health problems are preventable and preventing them should be a larger focus of the government. We should be united in combatting these issues. I read Trump’s executive order “Establishing the President’s Make America Healthy Again Commission” and found it extremely fair-minded. I was also relieve to find that vaccines were not even mentioned in it. Despite the litany of other questionable actions taken by the executive branch since Trump took office this year, I think most health professionals would agree with the aims of this executive order.
Yes, there are problems to solve, chief among them is quelling the anti-vaccine sentiment that finds a safety amidst the followers and advocates of the MAHA movement, but these problems will not be solved without genuine, authentic debate and engagement from the left. Now, I could be unaware of the fact this this is happening, perhaps it is, I’m not sure, I hope it is, and I hope to see evidence of this happening.
What I hate to see though is podcasts like Diabolical Lies, which I had never heard of until I decided to start doing research into the MAHA movement, ruthlessly bashing the MAHA movement with no shame in their March 23 podcast titled MAHA Moms & the Politics of “Wellness”. Now perhaps I’m being unfair to them, but after listening to the first 28 minutes of this podcast I couldn’t stand the feeling of being in a liberal echo-chamber, so I stopped listening to it as their discussion seemed completely unproductive. Nevertheless, their podcast did prompt me to go check out the January 28 episode of Honestly with Bari Weiss, which featured Casey Means, Jillian Michaels, and Vani Hari (aka “Food Babe”). I took a bunch of screenshots to capture timepoints during that episode that I intend to make commentary on in a follow-up to this post.
Listening to that episode of Honestly, I’m led to believe that the leaders of this movement are all well-intentioned and I agree with a lot of what they are advocating for. Most of the problems they talk about are real problems. My beef with the MAHA movement is not that they are generally anti-vegan (I like eating meat too), or that they are suspicious of the influence of large food corporations and pharmaceutical companies. My problem with the MAHA movement is one of approach and messaging.
The leaders of the MAHA movement are almost all affluent, wealthy individuals who face very few of the obstacles to improving health that most working-class Americans do. For this reason, their messaging doesn’t reach who it needs to because much of it is inaccessible to those who need the most help improving their health. I think this part is an easy fix. What is a more difficult fix, but arguably a more important fix, is altering the vibe of the movement. Let’s be honest, most people are not fans of MAGA, even many people who voted for Trump. So why is MAHA so partisan? Another vibe issue with the movement is its use of dogmatic messaging, fear mongering, and lack of nuance. I think they are using these tactic in part because they work, but they aren’t necessary for the changes they hope to bring about. Finally, as I’ve said earlier, the MAHA movement has become a safe-haven for vaccine skeptics, some of whom are quite moderate and reasonable, but many, if not most of whom are overtly anti-vaccine.
Stay Tuned
I have a lot more research to do on this topic and once I’ve further developed my understanding and perspective on MAHA I plan to submit an Op-Ed to a prominent newspaper or magazine. In the meantime, I hope you’ve learned something from the disjointed meanderings of thought and information that I’ve shared above.
Now, I need to just click post and go because UChicago’s Institute of Politics event “Is RFK Right About Our Food System”– featuring former senator Jon Tester, acclaimed nutritionist Dr. Marion Nestle, and Brian Choi, Managing Partner and CEO at the Food Institute– is just about to start. I’m very excited and hope to share about it soon.
Disclaimer: This newsletter provides health information and research for educational purposes only. It is not a substitute for professional medical advice. Consult a healthcare professional for guidance on your health-related decisions. We are not medical professionals.