MAGA-aligned Congresswoman Kat Cammack (R-FL) on Tuesday introduced a draft bill, the FRESH and Affordable Foods Act, which would reform rules on the information companies must provide to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) when submitting a notice that a food chemical is “generally recognized as safe” (GRAS).
Several food safety professionals and organizations are criticizing the bill, including Sarah Sorscher, Director of Regulatory Affairs for the Center for Science in the Public Interest, who in an op-ed in Food Safety News wrote: “While promising to strengthen food safety, the bill has two big rotten worms at its core: provisions that would broadly block state food safety policies while weakening current FDA authority over premarket safety review for substances used in foods.”
“There is something deeply rotten about a bill that promises to put FDA in charge of “review and evaluation” of safe food but hands the real safety decisions over to the food industry.” – @CSPI https://t.co/oDiLHbTOpv
— FoodFight USA (@food_fight_usa) April 28, 2026
Sorscher added that “the bill contains industry-backed preemption provisions that would broadly wipe out state protections” related to the labeling, sale, and marketing of food and dietary supplements, pointing out that big food companies, including General Mills and Coca-Cola, “last year launched a multimillion dollar effort to broadly preempt state safety and labeling laws.”
Consumer Reports responded to the bill with a statement from Brian Ronholm, Director of Food Policy: “At a time when consumers are demanding the removal of toxic chemicals in their food and greater transparency about food ingredients, the FRESH Act would instead weaken existing regulations that provide a layer of critical protections for consumers.” He added, “this bill would represent a significant step backward for our food oversight system. Consumer Reports calls on Congress to reject this bill.”
According to the nonprofit organization Environmental Working Group (EWG), the bill would:
- Preempt, retroactively and prospectively, all state food chemical laws, including those banning the toxic “forever chemicals” known as PFAS from food packaging and artificial dyes from school food.
- Allow new food chemicals linked to cancer and reproductive harm to be considered “safe.”
- Allow new food chemicals to be added to food without an affirmative finding of safety by the FDA.
- Retroactively approve all food chemicals currently considered GRAS.
- Allow new chemicals to be added to food if the FDA does not respond to a GRAS notice within 90 days.
- Allow new chemicals to be added to food as long as the food chemical company submits a “synopsis” of the chemical company’s safety conclusion.
- Allow new chemicals to be added to food without giving the FDA basic information, such as estimates of dietary exposure.
- Allow new chemicals reviewed by industry-funded expert panels – including the flavor industry’s notorious “expert” panel – to be automatically GRAS and used in food immediately.
- Allow companies to use food chemicals in new ways, without asking the FDA for approval.
- Allow chemicals to be added to food for two years after the FDA determines they are no longer safe, unless there is a severe and imminent risk of harm.
Melanie Benesh, EWG’s vice president for government affairs, said: “Every parent should be outraged that the food brands that want their trust propose leaving them with no protection from toxic chemicals in the food they serve their families. Allowing chemicals linked to cancer to be added to food without FDA approval – or without even sharing basic information with the FDA – will not make America healthy.”
[NOTE: The U.S. House Committee on Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Health will hold a hearing on Wednesday to consider the FRESH Act, among other pieces of legislation.]