Kennedy on Fox News: 'We Want the Dyes Out of the Foods' and GRAS Standards Will Go for Most Products, Mar. 20, 2025
March 20, 2025 · The White House · 0:01:31
Embedded from the source channel — never re-uploaded. Watch on YouTube
What happened
HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. told Fox News that the administration told food companies it wants the dyes out of the food, saying the science on the dyes is overwhelming, according to Kennedy. He noted that products such as Froot Loops are made with dyes in the United States while the same product in Canada and Europe does not have the dyes, according to his remarks.
Kennedy said the department has launched a review of the GRAS — Generally Recognized as Safe — standards and will get rid of the GRAS standards for most products, according to the clip. He explained the designation was created so staple foods such as flour, dairy, and eggs would not need testing when the FDA was created to regulate food, but that industry expanded it so any new chemical it wants to add is deemed generally recognized as safe with no review, according to Kennedy.
Kennedy said the United States has 10,000 ingredients in its food while Europe has only 400, and that the U.S. has the worst chronic disease burden of any country in the world, according to his remarks. He said the department will go back and review old ingredients to make sure they are safe and will encourage companies to remove them as quickly as possible, according to the clip.
Why it matters
The clip is the HHS secretary’s concise statement of the food-additives agenda — dyes out, GRAS reform, and a retrospective safety review — with the ingredient-count comparison he used to make the case.
Sources: The White House, “Secretary Kennedy on Fox News: “We Want the Dyes Out of the Foods””, 2025-03-20 (official upload, embedded above; published 2025-03-20). Transcript via Supadata (private research store, paraphrased and attributed, not republished). All figures and characterizations as stated by the speakers.
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