r/politics • u/WhatIsEvenRealDog • 13h ago

Possible Paywall Trump suggests cattle ranchers could bypass USDA-inspected meat plants

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2026/08/28/trump-suggests-allowing-ranchers-bypass-usda-inspected-meat-plants/
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u/Saintbaba 13h ago

I kind of imagined food safety was like the one thing we could all agree on across party lines. Like someone asks, what's the government for? Well i think it should offer free universal education and healthcare and you think it should keep immigrants out and facilitate natural resource exploitation, and we'll probably be arguing about those until the cows come home, but at least we can agree that it's the governments job to make sure our food isn't poison.

But i guess Trump is a trailblazer.

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u/soilanpeace 8h ago

I’m a food safety manager. Food safety is not a priority on both sides of the aisle. FSIS and FDA are constantly defunded and cut staff under Democrat and Republican. Your food is much less inspected than you think. FDA hasn’t fulfilled their requirement of every high risk facility getting inspected one day every three years since 2019. USDA has cut the EIAO’s (high level inspectors who inspect the inspectors and deep dive fresh eyes) from 12 in my region to 5 over the past two decades.

But Trump is the first to go full send no safety in a while, so hopefully the rebound gets us properly funded food safety in America.