Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr said that President Donald Trump calls him up “three or four times a week” to hound him with the same question.
Kennedy was speaking at an event Monday with Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins to push a policy banning sugary drinks, candy and junk food from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, as part of his “Make America Healthy Again” agenda.
Six months into his second term, Trump wants to know “why aren’t people healthier yet,” Kennedy told reporters at the press conference.
“We have full support from the president,” Kennedy said. “He wants this done. He promised to make America healthy again, and he’s gonna do that.”
“He called me last night,” Kennedy added, referring to the president. “He calls me three or four times a week and says, ‘Where are you? Why aren’t people healthier yet?’ So he’s keeping me under pressure.”
Monday’s event was promoting a policy adopted by West Virginia, Texas, Colorado, Louisiana, Oklahoma and Florida, barring SNAP participants from using food stamps to buy junk food. They join Arkansas, Idaho, Utah, Iowa, Indiana and Nebraska in the SNAP waiver initiative.
SNAP is a lifeline that keeps more than 41 million Americans, or 12 percent of the population, from going hungry. More than 13 million recipients are children.
Over the past 20 years, lawmakers in several states have proposed stopping SNAP from paying for everything from bottled water and soda to chips, ice cream and “luxury meats” such as steak.
Critics said that the SNAP waiver “ignores decades of evidence showing that incentive-based approaches — not punitive restrictions — are the most effective, dignified path to improving nutrition and reducing hunger,” said Gina Plata-Nino, a deputy director at the Food Research & Action Center, a nonprofit advocacy group.
Trump passed the largest-ever cuts to the program in his signature “One Big, Beautiful Bill” by restricting eligibility for SNAP enrollment and diverting a significant chunk of the program’s costs to states.
The Associated Press contributed reporting.
