There’s something undeniably fishy about the Trump administration’s handling of the rising outbreak of an explosive diarrhea-causing parasite — and we’re not talking about tainted iceberg lettuce.
On Saturday, the FDA announced that it had found traces of the Cyclospora cayetanensis parasite — which more than likely won’t kill you, but will almost certainly cause weeks of violent diarrhea — in samples of bagged shredded lettuce supplied by Taylor Farms, one of Taco Bell’s lead suppliers.
One day later, the agency suddenly reversed its decision, announcing that its test results were a false positive, seemingly exonerating Taylor Farms. The company is still carrying out a voluntary recall of the offending greens, a move first announced on Friday.
The unexpected twists and turns of the devastating outbreak highlight how the Trump administration is struggling to get coherent messaging out to the American people, a public health disaster facilitated by massive health budget cuts and major layoffs at the FDA, USDA, and CDC. We still don’t know exactly how many people are affected, numbers that vary wildly depending on whether you ask the CDC or individual states. It’s a confounding mess, compounded by the fact that the parasite is notoriously difficult to trace in a lab.
There are plenty of reasons to be suspicious of the FDA’s baffling reversal on Sunday. For one, the Trump administration’s relationship with the embattled food supplier goes way back. Case in point, Taylor Farms made a mysterious $1 million donation to the Trump-aligned super PAC MAGA Inc on March 26, 2025, as first spotted by lawyer and public health policy leader Matthew Cortland — six days before the FDA loosened food traceability rules which could’ve helped prevent outbreaks like the current one.
The company appears to have considerable sway in Washington, DC. On July 17, a day before the FDA announced it had found traces of the parasite, the New York Times reported that Taylor Farms representatives had met with White House and FDA officials the day before to discuss what the company viewed as “shortfalls in the FDA and CDC’s outbreak response process.”
While it’s unclear whether the supplier successfully strong-armed the FDA into going back on its initial claims of having found traces of the parasite, the timelines are certainly suspect. According to the NYT, Taylor Farms had also hired lobbyist Trent Morse, who served as the deputy director of the White House Presidential Personnel Office before he resigned in September.
The story only gets stranger after the FDA issued its mea culpa. In the early morning hours of Monday, Taylor Farms published an “update” — which has since been deleted for an unknown reason — claiming that the FDA had “apologized to us” while trying to reassure customers that “all other Taylor Farms products… are not involved in the recall.”
Less than 12 hours later, the FDA once again pulled a 180.
“To clarify, this false-positive lab sample DOES NOT change the basis for FDA’s ongoing outbreak investigation or the overwhelming epidemiological data supporting the current voluntary recall by Taylor Farms,” the agency tweeted on Monday.
“FDA’s traceback investigation and outbreak data continue to converge on shredded iceberg lettuce from Taylor Farms locations in central Mexico,” the statement reads. “FDA will continue to work with federal and state partners to investigate this multistate outbreak and ensure products implicated in this outbreak have been removed from the market.”
It’s hard to rule out that White House officials were trying to vindicate Taylor Farms, considering the Trump administration has long been accused of giving major MAGA Inc donors favorable “pay for access” treatment. Taylor Farms’ willingness to recall the lettuce alone speaks volumes.
Naturally, the White House is now accusing the media of putting far too much of a spin on the story.
“This is how the FAKE NEWS works: imply collusion, ignore the facts,” the Health and Human Services Department, which oversees the FDA, tweeted on Monday, replying to reporting by Meidas Touch about Taylor Farms’ PAC donation. “Nothing influences our decisions except science and the safety of the American people.”
By Tuesday, the White House had already declared victory, with HHS secretary and notorious anti-vaccine activist Robert Kennedy Jr claiming that the outbreak was “under control.” He vaguely referred to “companies that are involved,” which had “implemented a recall” — but never mentioned Taylor Farms by name.
We’ll leave it up to you whether that’s reassuring enough to pick up a heavily discounted pack of shredded iceberg lettuce at the local Whole Foods. As of Tuesday, Michigan alone is dealing with over 6,500 cases.
More on the saga: Taylor Farms Made Huge Donation to Trump Group After Loosening of Rules That Could Have Prevented Explosive Diarrhea Outbreak
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