In a move that has sent ripples through the public health and nutrition communities, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the United States Secretary of Health and Human Services, is preparing to issue new dietary guidelines that would encourage Americans to eat more saturated fats—including red meat, butter, cheese, and cream. The announcement, which surfaced in late October 2025, has reignited debates over the role of saturated fats in the American diet and the integrity of the nation’s nutritional policymaking process.
According to reporting by The Hill and The Guardian, Kennedy’s forthcoming guidelines will "stress the need to eat saturated fats of dairy, of good meat, of fresh meat and vegetables… when we release those, it will give everybody the rationale for driving it into our schools." This policy shift directly contradicts decades of recommendations from leading health organizations and government agencies, which have consistently advised limiting saturated fat intake due to its established link to elevated cholesterol and increased risk of cardiovascular disease.
The American Heart Association, among others, has long maintained that saturated fats should comprise less than 6 percent of daily caloric intake. The current federal guideline, which governs everything from school lunches to military rations, sets the cap at 10 percent. Kennedy’s proposal, by contrast, would push that number up to 10 percent—and possibly higher in some institutional settings. As Air Mail noted, Kennedy is a self-professed fan of raw, unpasteurized milk and has publicly criticized what he calls the "unfair demonization" of saturated fats, blaming refined carbohydrates and ultra-processed foods as the true dietary villains.
This dramatic departure from established norms has alarmed many nutrition experts. Cheryl Anderson, a board member of the American Heart Association and a professor at the University of California, San Diego, urged caution. "My response and sort of counsel to myself was to stay calm, and let’s see what happens, because there was no indication given as to how, why, when this potential shift would occur," Anderson told The Guardian. "The recommendation around saturated fat has been one of the most consistent recommendations since the first edition of the dietary guidelines."
Ronald Krauss, a professor of pediatrics and medicine at the University of California, San Francisco, whose research has challenged some earlier assumptions about saturated fats, was nonetheless critical of Kennedy’s message. "If [Kennedy] is actually going to go out and say, we should be eating more saturated fat, I think that’s really the wrong message," Krauss told The Hill. His studies have shown that saturated fat is "relatively neutral" compared to what scientists once believed, but only if replaced with healthier unsaturated fats—like those found in olive oil or plant sources. Replacing saturated fats with sugars or refined carbohydrates, on the other hand, can actually increase the risk of heart disease.
The complexity of nutrition science is part of what makes this policy debate so contentious. Krauss explained, "For example, there is plenty of evidence that meat intake, especially processed red meats, is associated with elevated heart disease risk. Now the question is, is that due to saturated fat, or is it due to other properties of these meats? And we really don’t have the answer to that." Anderson agreed, emphasizing that "people don’t eat nutrients. They eat foods." She added, "When you ask someone what they had to eat, they don’t tell you: ‘I had fat, or I had carbohydrates, or I had protein.’" Both experts concurred that shifting the focus from individual nutrients to overall dietary patterns is both less confusing for the public and more scientifically sound.
Despite these nuances, Anderson remains firm that saturated fat is not "neutral" in the context of the current American diet. "When you look at the current American diet, there’s too much saturated fat in it, and so, currently, it’s not having a neutral impact on our population," she said. She pointed out that higher consumption of saturated fats is linked to elevated cholesterol and greater cardiovascular disease risk—a view echoed by the American Heart Association and many public health authorities.
The process by which Kennedy’s guidelines are being developed has also raised eyebrows. Typically, the Dietary Guidelines for Americans—a report published every five years by an independent advisory committee—guides federal nutritional policy. The latest version, which would cover 2025 through 2030, has not yet been released. Anderson noted that the current administration appears to be bypassing this established protocol. Krauss added, "It appears that report is being overruled, in a sense," and expressed uncertainty about the final form of Kennedy’s recommendations.
If adopted, Kennedy’s guidelines could have far-reaching effects. Not only would they influence the nutritional standards for school lunches and military rations (potentially raising saturated fat content in those meals to as high as 18 or 19 percent of total calories), but they could also shape the broader national conversation about what constitutes a healthy diet. Krauss warned, "That could certainly have an adverse effect on the population’s cholesterol levels, and that would be predicted to impact heart disease risk." He suggested that Kennedy is "looking at evidence in a very cherrypicking kind of way," mixing responsible recommendations about processed foods with more controversial claims about saturated fat.
Meanwhile, the Kennedy administration’s approach to public health policy has come under additional scrutiny. Months before the saturated fat announcement, Kennedy’s Department of Health and Human Services eliminated the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) team responsible for overseeing safety guidelines for birth control. Shortly after, all but one member of the 50-person Office of Population Affairs—which manages federal funding for reproductive health services and runs an assisted-IVF program—were dismissed. As Air Mail observed, this move seemed to contradict the administration’s stated goal of boosting U.S. birth rates.
Against this backdrop of policy upheaval, Kennedy’s personal life has also attracted media attention. On October 25, 2025, a MAHA insider told the New York Post that journalist Olivia Nuzzi’s forthcoming memoir, American Canto, had "blindsided" Kennedy and left his wife, Cheryl Hines, "in a state of shock and distress." The memoir, set to be published one month after Hines’s own book, Unscripted, has fueled speculation about Kennedy’s standing within the administration and the ongoing turbulence in his private life.
As the nation awaits the release of the new dietary guidelines, the stakes could hardly be higher. With heart disease still the leading cause of death in the United States, the debate over saturated fats—and the broader question of how public health policy should be shaped—remains as urgent and contentious as ever.
