What's with the whole milk stuff?
Many netizens are trying to understand a new, weird health campaign. Let's discuss white supremacist dog whistles, health, MAHA's culture war, Big Dairy, the Epstein Files, and the midterms.
A bizarre health campaign has rolled out across social media.
Following the reveal of a new inverted food pyramid and related nutritional guidelines — which include the recommendation of consuming more animal protein, classifies butter and beef tallow as “healthy fats,” and removes specific daily limits for alcohol consumption — from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) and Department of Health and Human Services (US HHS), a slew of posts about drinking whole milk have been released by both agencies and the White House. It seems these posts started on January 11th, 2026, a day declared “National Milk Day.”
National Milk Day was created by the USDA apparently to commemorate the start of milk delivery in sealed, sterilized glass bottles in 1878. Sealed, sterilized milk delivery was considered a significant step for food safety and public health (although, as we will discuss in this article, the health benefits of milk consumption are complicated). Descriptions of National Milk Day also state it was created to honor dairy farmers and the “cultural significance of milk,” and promote milk’s nutrients like calcium, protein, and vitamin D. This national day, its description, and this whole milk public health campaign smells of the behemothic influence of the US dairy industry, which has a total economic impact of around $780-794 billion annually. The industry provides millions of jobs and billions in wages and tax revenue, and accounts for about 3.5% of US gross domestic product (GDP). Importantly, the US dairy industry is highly consolidated, dominated by a few massive dairy cooperatives like Dairy Farmers of America (DFA), Land O’Lakes, and California Dairies, which control the majority of the market and threaten the profitability of small farms. These companies invest in staying powerful through a rich marketing, lobbying, and research apparatus. It appears that the Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) movement, which has captured US federal health agencies, is receptive to Big Dairy’s investments.
If you haven’t seen the posts in this health campaign — I envy you.
It started with USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins posting a picture of herself smiling with a glass of milk on National Milk Day: “Drink Whole Milk.” Then, a more threatening, theoretically machismo, “Art of the Deal”/The Apprentice-esque photo of President Donald Trump was posted by USDA. “Drink up, America,” the post says. Donald is leaning over his oval office desk, a glass of milk in front of him, and he has a “milk mustache” — a motif that is reminiscent of the “Got Milk?” adverts of the 1990s (a campaign which was obviously an effort by the dairy industry and USDA to influence the public to drink more milk and even to perceive milk as unequivocally healthy). “The Milk Mustache is Back.” “Drink Whole Milk.” Another post from the White House shows Trump holding old-fashioned glass milk bottle carriers. Then, a video of Secretary Rollins joined by dairy farmers was posted. In the video, Rollins and the farmers advocate for drinking whole milk and eating whole foods in schools, with one farmer suggesting that there should be more government programs to support this.
On January 14th, 2026, President Trump signed several executive orders and bills. One of which was the Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act of 2025. The bill revises requirements for milk provided by the USDA’s National School Lunch Program. Schools participating in the program are required to provide milk that is consistent with the most recent dietary guidelines for Americans, which would now be the ones that were recently released. Prior to this bill and the new guidelines, USDA regulations required milk to be fat-free or low-fat. This was an Obama-era policy that started in July 2012 as part of the 2010 Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act, with the intention of combating childhood obesity by reducing saturated fat intake (more on this later). The 2025-2026 bill modifies these requirements to allow for whole milk.
Notably, previous USDA regulations also required that the average saturated fat content of the lunches provided be less than 10% of the total calories. Under the 2025-2026 bill, fluid milk is excluded from the saturated fat content calculation. This is pretty blatant and fits with a criticism of the new dietary guidelines from some nutritionists which states that it is impossible for a person to keep their saturated fat consumption below 10% of the total calories under the new guidelines (the math isn’t math-ing).
A creepy social media campaign
The White House’s “Rapid Response 47” Twitter account posted a video of President Trump signing this bill. Trump asks two little girls standing next to him whether he should sign it or not. He signs it, then he briefly reaches out and touches one of the little girl’s hands. He passes the signed bill to a little boy also standing there. The interaction personally makes me uncomfortable, given the recent release of more files on American pedophile Jeffrey Epstein, which included mentions and allegations of child abuse against Trump himself. As cult members do to protect their leader, members of MAHA and MAGA online are claiming that feeling such discomfort is “projection,” or “says more about” the person made uncomfortable than Trump. The mental gymnastics required to deny the creepiness of an alleged pedophile posing with kids next to a jug of milk, especially if you believed in QAnon, are Olympic-level. We’ll see you in Los Angeles in 2028!
But things were just starting to get weird. The USDA then posted a video of transphobe, fifth-place loser, now conservative grifter Riley Gaines drinking whole milk and donning a milk mustache. The text accompanying the video said: “Nutrition shouldn’t be controversial. It’s common sense.” This is approximately when these posts started to get attention online, with netizens asking why there was a seemingly sudden focus on whole milk and making fun of MAHA and MAGA for only knowing this one failed, relatively unknown athlete and using her in a campaign that is supposed to echo “Got Milk?” (which included Britney Spears, Beyoncé, Rihanna, Serena Williams, Venus Williams, Batman, Mario, and SpongeBob).
Then the White House account posted an image of a Donald Trump character in a barn that looks exactly like one from the beloved game Stardew Valley. “We’re bringing back Whole Milk and Making America Healthy Again!,” the character says. “Whole milk is back,” the post says, although whole milk has always been commercially available and the only real changes that have occurred are the US dietary guidelines and the requirements for milk in school lunches. Netizens grew more confused and annoyed, stating that there is probably little overlap between Stardew Valley players and MAHA and MAGA and imploring the creator of the game, Eric Barone or “ConcernedApe,” to sue the administration for using the game’s likeness.
It gets worse. On January 15th, Secretary Kennedy posts an artificial intelligence (AI)-generated video of himself drinking a glass of whole milk, which transports him to the clurb. While showing off his milk mustache, he dances in a state of pure euphoria with his glass of milk to Kato feat. Jon’s song “Turn the Lights off,” a reference to a meme of John Hamm dancing in the show “Friends & Neighbors.” These people cannot create their own aesthetics for the life of them.
And now, the worst one: on January 17th, the USDA posted an AI-generated video of three children drinking milk. “Kids deserve real nutrition. Always have,” the post reads. The kids are posing with three cups of milk, wearing Peter Pan collars (a “trad”/traditional aesthetic), bows for the girl, stockings, and are all white and blonde or blonde-ish. This video, which netizens say evokes the uncanny valley, as well as an aesthetic of an 1800s child tuberculosis ward, was the final nail in the coffin. Netizens began to ask: why are they suddenly talking about whole milk so much? What’s going on here? This is weird. So, let’s talk about the reason why.
An easy “win” for MAHA
