Even in the era of “Make America Healthy Again” and Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. calling sugar “poison,” Republicans aren’t showing any signs of backing away from propping up the sugar industry.
Both the House and Senate versions of President Donald Trump’s budget reconciliation bills include the largest loan rate increases for sugar farmers in decades, a move the sugar industry has long advocated for.
“Sugar is not a poison. Our brain works off of sugar,” House Agriculture Committee chair Glenn “GT” Thompson told NOTUS. “Kennedy can have whatever beliefs he chooses to have. Obviously, I respect the fact he has his beliefs, but I know American agriculture.”
Right-leaning and libertarian groups, including the American Enterprise Institute, the CATO Institute and The Heritage Foundation, have railed for years against the high loan rates propping up U.S. sugar producers. Some saw Kennedy’s nomination as a chance to get the rest of the party on board.
“His quest to make America healthy again won’t be easy, but it should include tackling Big Sugar, an industry that has substantially increased Americans’ grocery prices — and significantly decreased their health,” The Heritage Foundation’s Andrew Hale wrote ahead of Kennedy’s confirmation.
But the deep-pocketed sugar industry isn’t feeling a hit. The provisions in the Republican trifecta’s biggest legislation this year mark a major win, after the industry was one of the biggest agricultural campaign spenders last election cycle.
The stated goal of the U.S. sugar program — originating from a 1981 agricultural support program, according to the Government Accountability Office — is to boost domestic sugar prices. A major facet of this is the Department of Agriculture’s loans to sugar processors. The USDA cannot recoup the loans it makes to sugar processors for anything other than direct payment or for collateral — in this program, pounds of sugar.
The sugar industry benefits from increased loan rates because the USDA generally doesn’t want sugar forfeitures; it wants sugar processors to sell and profit enough to be able to pay back the loans. The reconciliation bills would increase the loan rate from 19.75 to 24 cents per pound. With the loan rate modification, USDA is incentivized to try to boost sugar prices high enough to make that happen, including using other sugar program tools like import restrictions.
Vincent Smith, a longtime sugar program critic at AEI, told NOTUS he’s not holding out hope for the political will on the right to change the program, even in the MAHA era.
“The budget hawks on the Republican side don’t see the sugar program as, in a sense, a problem,” Smith said, arguing that sugar farm payouts are structured in such a way that they don’t affect the budget’s bottom line, but instead present the equivalent of a tax on Americans at the grocery store by artificially inflating prices.
“The folks who voted for Trump because of Kennedy’s position on trying to improve American health — if [Republican leaders] think that they can keep those votes, and they thought they could keep those votes by terminating the sugar program and saying, ‘Look what we’re doing for your kids’ long-run health,’ that might make a difference,” he said. “But it’s really hard to see that sort of argument coming forward right now.”
Thompson told NOTUS that there was no taxpayer cost for the loan rate increase and anyone who calls the sugar program “a subsidy obviously is not well informed in terms of agriculture policy.”
Not everyone familiar with agriculture policy agrees. Nationwide sugar company Indiana Sugars has a webpage titled “Why is Sugar a Government Subsidized Commodity?” A bullet item about the loan program notes “the subsidy does not result in raised taxes for consumers.”
Critics of the program point to the massive campaign checks the sugar industry writes to lawmakers as a motivation to publicly praise MAHA while supporting what they characterize as industry payouts.
Florida Crystals, the biggest U.S. sugar producer, made its largest campaign donation last year — $1 million — to Trump’s Make America Great Again Inc. committee. Its second-largest check was a quarter of a million dollars to Project Rescue America, a political action committee supporting Florida Sen. Rick Scott.
Scott is also a member of the Senate’s newly formed MAHA Caucus. His office did not respond to an emailed request for comment about the sugar program boost.
Other Republican lawmakers on the Senate’s MAHA Caucus, a potential target for the conservative sugar program critics, were quick to plead ignorance about the big industry-backed increases.
“I have not looked into it, and I’ve not heard about it, but sounds like I might need to,” Republican Sen. Cynthia Lummis told NOTUS.
“I didn’t know the price had gone up, so that’s news,” Sen. Tommy Tuberville echoed. He is in both the MAHA Caucus and serves on the Senate Agriculture Committee. “Sugar has really no problem right now, they’re doing pretty well.”
Kennedy’s landmark MAHA report last month — while riddled with errors including citations to studies that don’t exist, issues in the agriculture sections, and misinterpretations of some of the real studies it cites — specifically criticizes the food pyramid for being “influenced by research from the sugar industry.”
In response to questions from NOTUS about the reconciliation bill, HHS said, “The Secretary continues to champion policies that advance transparency in food labeling, eliminate harmful additives, and prioritize access to whole, nutritious foods—regardless of industry pressure.” The agency did not respond to whether Kennedy supports the industry-backed sugar loan rate increases.
Industry representatives insist the increases are necessary and are arguing they’re aligned with MAHA.
“America’s hardworking sugarbeet and sugarcane farmers agree that chronic diseases are serious and warrant attention. Real sugar made from sugarbeets and sugarcane is a natural and essential ingredient in countless everyday foods vital to a balanced and healthy diet,” the American Sugar Alliance wrote in a statement from Rob Johansson, its director of economics and policy analysis.
“The loan rates proposed in the House and Senate Reconciliation bills will mark the first meaningful increase in 40 years and a necessary step to keep sugar production in America and less dependent on foreign suppliers,” he added.
But some critics say they’re still shouting in the wind against the program.
“The sugar program is really a scandal,” Smith said. “It’s an astonishing example of how a very small group of people — it’s very literally 4,000 farms — are extorting $40 a year from every family of four in the United States and have done so for a very long time.”
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Claire Heddles and Nuha Dolby are NOTUS reporters and Allbritton Journalism Institute fellows.