Stephanie Armour
When a “Make America Healthy Again” summit was held on the posh Waldorf Astoria in Washington, the road of attendees stretched down the block.
The daylong, invitation-only occasion in November featured a who’s who of MAHA luminaries. Vice President JD Vance attended, as did Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the chief of the advert hoc motion whose members rail in opposition to vaccines, Big Pharma, and ultraprocessed meals.
During a fireside chat that organizers broadcasted on-line, Vance extolled MAHA’s affect on the Trump administration, calling it “a critical part of our success in Washington.”
The summit underscored simply how carefully Republicans have hitched themselves to the MAHA marketing campaign, banking on its recognition to present them an electoral bounce within the midterms. But the technique carries dangers, as a result of support for Kennedy is cratering and polls present voters care more about lowering well being care prices than MAHA priorities resembling ending vaccine mandates and selling uncooked milk.
“Polls show clearly MAHA issues are not the top issues for people,” mentioned Robert Blendon, a professor emeritus of well being coverage and political evaluation at Harvard University. “The top health care voting issue is cost, and costs are actually rising.”
The disconnect was on show Nov. 12, the day of the MAHA summit, the place attendees picked up swag baggage and mingled amid the resort’s blue-velvet couches and crystal chandeliers.
Just a few blocks away on the White House, President Donald Trump that day signed legislation to reopen the federal authorities. The 43-day shutdown centered on disagreement over expiring Affordable Care Act subsidies, which Democrats needed to increase and GOP congressional management declined to take up. The authorities went again to enterprise and, within the midst of a political and legislative push and pull, these subsidies expired on the finish of 2025. That has fueled the nationwide affordability debate, as lots of the roughly 24 million individuals who purchase protection on the well being legislation’s marketplaces are actually going through premium funds greater than double what they confronted final yr. In January, Congress continues to wrestle with what has emerged as a key kitchen desk subject.
Said Blendon: “MAHA is not lowering the cost.”
MAHA was mainstreamed as a part of the political platform embraced by Kennedy, an environmental lawyer and anti-vaccine activist who ran for president in 2023 and 2024. When he suspended his marketing campaign and endorsed Trump, Kennedy united MAHA with conservatives, marrying the “health freedom” motion with MAGA.
But the motion took root earlier than then, throughout the covid pandemic, grounded in the concept the U.S. is within the throes of a continual illness epidemic brought on by corruption within the meals, medical, and pharmaceutical industries, in addition to federal companies. Some adherents are also skeptical of or against vaccines.
“Covid was really eye-opening for people,” mentioned Andrea Nazarenko, a psychologist and MAHA supporter who co-authored a book on food as medicine. “They realized, ‘Wait a minute — the systems I trusted may not be as trustworthy as I thought.’ At its core, people are noticing the systems they relied on are failing them.”
MAHA has since emerged as an influential power for the GOP, gaining important clout in a short while. Case in level: Early this month, Kennedy introduced new dietary guidelines and up to date childhood vaccine recommendations, which have been each a part of the motion’s want listing and departures from present frameworks.
In addition, members of Congress have based a MAHA caucus. Lawmakers in Republican-led states are introducing or passing laws to advance the MAHA agenda, together with legal guidelines to limit mRNA vaccines or ban certain additives in meals. And meals producers together with Nestle, General Mills, and Kraft Heinz have pledged to take away synthetic dyes or components.
Republicans see the MAHA constituency as vital within the 2026 midterm elections and past. Its supporters embody fascinating voting demographics — independents and a few Democrats, a lot of whom are girls, youthful voters, or suburbanites. About 21% of impartial voters and eight% of Democratic voters held a good or considerably favorable view of MAHA as of early fall, based on a poll by Change Research.
“I think one reason I won reelection was that I advocated for the covid-vaccine-injured and was an ally of Bobby Kennedy back then when he was being vilified,” Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) mentioned. “People appreciated that. It’s about basic health.”
Republicans are relying on a MAHA bounce, and political analysts say they might want it. The celebration took a drubbing in November’s statewide races, and Trump’s approval rating has slumped from 47% in early 2025 to 36% by December, based on Gallup polls. Those are ominous tendencies for the GOP, for the reason that celebration with the presidency has misplaced floor in 20 of the past 22 midterm House elections.
Meanwhile, cracks are beginning to threaten the Make America Great Again coalition and the lockstep help Trump has loved from Capitol Hill Republicans. While MAGA exhibits indicators of weakening, MAHA is flourishing.
“Kennedy has ratified the Republican agenda around health and food,” mentioned David Mansdoerfer, who served in HHS management throughout the first Trump administration. “We sound very much like the issues Democrats were into in the 1990s and 2000s. We’ve almost done a 180 and co-opted a topic under a Republican agenda.”
Kennedy is predicted to quickly verify one other merchandise off MAHA’s listing by urgent states to take away fluoride from the water provide, based on a supply who requested to stay nameless as a result of he isn’t licensed to talk to the media.
But Republicans’ embrace of MAHA within the run-up to the November midterm elections might additionally value them, political strategists say.
Polling exhibits widespread help for MAHA initiatives resembling ridding meals of artificial dyes, however voters are far much less passionate about Kennedy and his denouncements of vaccines and efforts to restrict entry to them. Almost 60% of adults disapprove of his work as head of HHS, based on polling released in October by KFF, a well being data nonprofit that features KFF Health News.
And solely 26% of registered voters help defunding mRNA vaccine analysis, based on a September survey by left-leaning pollster Navigator Research. In the identical ballot, 3 in 4 reported feeling positively towards the measles vaccine.
Still, the Trump administration has broadened and accelerated its assault on vaccines. The Food and Drug Administration’s prime vaccine official in November said in a memo that the company would overhaul vaccine regulation, asserting with out proof that at the very least 10 youngsters had died from covid pictures.
In December, a federal vaccine advisory panel handpicked by Kennedy voted to cease recommending routine vaccination of newborns in opposition to hepatitis B. Medical teams denounced the panel’s actions, saying the vaccine is protected and that the advice would result in extra infections with the virus, which causes critical liver harm.
Democrats see a gap. The Democratic Doctors Caucus, a gaggle of medical medical doctors in Congress, issued a statement condemning the federal advisory panel’s modified suggestion on the hepatitis B vaccine, calling it an assault on primary science. And Democratic Reps. Frank Pallone of New Jersey, Diana DeGette of Colorado, and Yvette Clarke of New York wrote to the FDA commissioner demanding knowledge from the company on the covid demise claims.
Highlighting the dangers of the Trump administration’s anti-vaccine initiatives is simply a part of Democrats’ sport plan to counter Republicans’ alliance with MAHA.
Strategists describe three goals: Expose GOP insurance policies that run counter to MAHA priorities; trumpet Democrats’ efforts to sort out well being care prices; and spotlight their very own celebration’s work on such MAHA targets as cracking down on pesticide-makers.
“If people want to be healthier, they need affordable health care, and Democrats are the only ones pushing for affordable health care,” mentioned C.J. Warnke, communications director for the House Majority PAC, a fundraising group that works to elect extra Democrats.
Most notably, the technique to date hasn’t actually concerned assaults on Kennedy or MAHA itself.
“If Democrats focus on attacking Kennedy, saying he’s crazy and he has a brain worm, some voters hear that as reinforcing the notion that Democrats are wedded to Big Pharma and Big Ag,” mentioned Justin Zorn, a senior adviser on the Center for Economic and Policy Research, a progressive nonprofit centered on financial coverage.
So Democrats will discuss their persevering with combat to deal with well being care prices, resembling with a potential retroactive repair to the now-expired ACA subsidies, or a bill by Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) to forestall pesticide producers from getting authorized immunity in opposition to well being claims. And they plan to debate Trump administration actions that seemingly run counter to the MAHA agenda, resembling a choice by the Environmental Protection Agency to chill out the health assessments of the carcinogen formaldehyde.
“Everything they’re doing actually makes people sicker with higher bills, dirtier air, and fewer people covered with insurance,” mentioned Jesse Ferguson, a Democratic strategist. “Democrats do need to take MAHA seriously and can’t brush it off. The core is to show Democrats are focused on health and health care and exposing what the Republican agenda means.”
For Republicans, the following batch of MAHA occasions and summits is already scheduled. After taking a political again seat in recent times, well being care might dominate the 2026 election races.
