Sweeping cuts and the “politicization of science” inside the Food and Drug Administration have increased the risk of safety lapses across the US, former agency workers warned.
Less than a year after Donald Trump returned to power, and his administration oversaw the firing and resignation of thousands of FDA employees, a listeria outbreak that killed six people and sickened 27 across 18 states due to contamination of prepared pasta meals underlined the danger posed by safety failings.
“Those kinds of things are going to keep coming,” said David Harbourt, a former veterinary safety manager at the FDA, who was fired last year. The agency’s work “has been compromised for at a minimum, the short term, hopefully not the long term”, he claimed. “But it’s those aspects of American people’s lives that we almost take for granted that are going to be affected in a very negative way in the coming years.”
About 19,700 employees worked at the agency before Trump officials introduced waves of firings, voluntary retirement and resignation programs. Thousands subsequently left, although some workers were later rehired.
“I am concerned that by letting go so many people, by offering early retirement, it’s like that kids’ game Jenga where you pile up all these wooden pieces,” said Sandra Eskin, CEO of Stop Foodborne Illness, a non-profit, and former deputy under secretary for food safety at the US Department of Agriculture. “And if you pull one out from the bottom or even the middle, the whole thing falls apart.
The FDA “does not have a robust inspection program for the foods that it regulates”, she said. “And so if that’s your baseline, and then you’re cutting back inspectors, then that is very concerning.”
Foreign food inspections by the FDA have dropped to the lowest on record since the agency began inspecting foreign food facilities in 2011, aside from during the Covid-19 pandemic. Domestic inspections also steeply declined.
Due to cuts, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which works with the FDA and other agencies to conduct surveillance for food pathogens, reduced the number of pathogens they surveil through its Foodnet surveillance program from eight to two.
Frank Yiannas, former FDA deputy commissioner for food policy and response under the first Trump administration, and into the Biden administration, expressed concern about the reduction in surveillance, with food recalls already on the rise. “Foodnet and the pathogens that they track is critical, because it’s the ultimate scorecard of whether we’re getting better or worse on performance in food safety,” he said.
“Consumers in general, when they hear there are cuts to food-borne disease surveillance programs at the CDC, they should pay attention,” added Yiannas. “It’s not a good idea if any food-borne illness remains invisible. We need to know about these things so that we can gather why they happen in the first place, and inform future prevention.”
As the FDA grapples with these cuts, former workers criticized the treatment of employees, the wastefulness of firings and rehirings, and dismissed claims by the Trump administration that the cuts have no impact on the agency’s ability to effectively execute its mission.
Harbourt, the fired safety manager, said his position’s responsibilities were replaced with two full-time employees, who were pulled away from their initial employment positions. “Turning the federal government into a temp employee agency is going to have negative effects for all Americans across a number of different aspects of their lives – some of which we’re already seeing,” he said.
Rightwing media pundits have called federal employees “entitled bureaucrats”, “worthless parasites”, and “completely worthless” amid cuts to the federal workforce. Russell Vought, whom Trump tapped to lead the office of management and budget, stated shortly before the 2024 election that “we want the bureaucrats to be traumatically affected”.
“The vast majority of federal employees really do try to do the best work for the American public,” added Harbourt. “Seeing that framed as something where we’re all worthless, and we’re just leeches on the American taxpayer is objectively false, and it’s been a really discouraging aspect of this whole process.”
A former FDA employee, who requested to remain anonymous to speak without fear of retaliation, criticized the manner in which the administration is transforming the agency.
“We are seeing more policy announcements through journal articles and podcasts rather than through carefully constructed guidance documents that allow for the public to provide comment,” they said. “The FDA has always steered clear from politics as much as it was able, but we’ve seen such a politicization of science with this administration.”
A third former employee at the FDA, who also requested to remain anonymous, said: “For impact public health-wise, this is devastating. Agencies like FDA rely on scientific studies, but do you know what can’t happen without funding? Research. And federal agencies have a responsibility to report to the American people, so without communications professionals, research findings and reporting does not get shared and agency web pages sit stagnant.”
The current leader of the FDA, Martin Makary, and Robert FKennedy Jr, head of the Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees the agency, have both pushed and touted health related conspiracy theories. Makary recently promoted lab leak conspiracy theories about HIV and Lyme disease on a podcast.
“Scientific integrity has been destroyed by Secretary Kennedy and Secretary Makary. Many longtime FDA leaders have been pushed out, or left, because there is no more credibility in US public health,” the former employee said.
“I believe that this decimation of the federal workforce will set us back as a country for decades,” they said. “We are no longer a world leader in public health, and that’s a scary thing.”
The Department of Health and Human Services did not comment on Makary’s recent claims. “FDA inspectors were not impacted, and this critical work will continue uninterrupted,” Emily Hilliard, a spokesperson, said. “The FDA remains fully committed to protecting the public and ensuring the safety and efficacy of the products it regulates. Enforcement decisions are grounded in the latest gold-standard science. This will not change.”
Another former FDA employee, who requested to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation, said it was “absurd” to claim that thousands of job cuts would have no impact. “It doesn’t even pass the laugh test,” they said. “What organization isn’t going to be impacted by the departure, not just of a lot of people, but entire offices?”
