The Congressional Bill that BIG CHEM Doesn’t Want You to Know About

MAHA Sounds Alarm Over Pesticide Transparency and Liability

MAHA supporters have raised vital concerns about a section of a new EPA and Department of the Interior Appropriations Bill currently making its way through Congress.

Food and Water Watch, an NGO that monitors food, water and climate with the goal of holding corporations and government accountable for their actions, did not mince words about the bill, titling its July 22 article, “House Committee Advances Bill to Keep Public in Dark About Pesticide Risks: Appropriations bill rider would prevent the EPA from improving warning labels on dangerous pesticides, as industry pushes to shield manufacturers from health-related lawsuits.”

Dr. Meryl Nass

Dr. Meryl Nass, who has been closely monitoring this legislation, told the MAHA Report: “While Appropriations Committee members argued about what the bill rider really meant, presumably because they were ashamed to support a multibillion-dollar giveaway to the pesticide industry,” she said, “the legislation will prevent those injured by pesticides from seeking a remedy in court.”

She continued, “Despite its opaque language, the bill rider will essentially end the ‘failure to warn’ doctrine, which has led to Bayer/Monsanto paying out $11 billion to tens of thousands of plaintiffs who were injured since 2018.”

The most dangerous part of the bill, its critics say, is Section 453 of the 2026 Department of Interior, Environment and Related Agencies. This portion of the proposed legislation will prevent the EPA and pesticide makers from taking the necessary legal and ethical precautions to inform the public about potential health dangers of pesticide and herbicide products including the controversial weed killer, Round Up.

The proposed legislation establishes a significant regulatory impediment: it will hinder the Environmental Protection Agency’s ability to fulfill its responsibility of collaborating with manufacturers of toxic chemicals. More specifically, to do so while providing adequate warnings about the serious health risks, including infertility, associated with exposure to pesticides and herbicides.

Section 453 significantly restricts the EPA’s authority to evaluate and approve timely updates to warning labels. Additionally, many legal scholars have concluded that Section 453 precludes Americans from pursuing legal recourse in courts.

EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin (left) and Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. (right)

These restrictions impede access to critical information that would otherwise become part of the public record through last-resort litigation. Section 453 establishes "impossibility preemption," which compels courts to dismiss otherwise valid claims.

Impossibility preemption is a Constitutional doctrine which mandates that courts follow federal law over a potentially contradictory state law when compliance with both is impossible.

Because Section 453 hinders the EPA from fulfilling its primary responsibilities, courts, including state courts, may be compelled to dismiss otherwise legitimate claims related to personal injury from pesticide exposure due to a regulatory backlog imposed on the EPA by the legislation.

This is why, along with many doctors and scientists, MAHA advocates are encouraging Congress to reconsider Section 453.