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The White House unveiled new dietary guidelines Wednesday, with officials calling it the “most significant reset of federal nutrition policy in history,” though many core recommendations stayed the same.
The guidelines are represented by an upside-down pyramid placing vegetables, fruits, proteins, dairy and healthy fats at the top and whole grains at the bottom.
“The new guidelines recognize that whole, nutrient-dense food is the most effective path to better health and lower health care costs,” Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said in a White House press briefing.
“The new framework centers on protein and healthy fats, vegetables, fruits and whole grains. It’s upside down, a lot of people say. It was actually upside down before,” he added.
The initial food pyramid was introduced in the 1990s, showing a small amount of sugars at the top, recommending 2-4 servings of dairy, meat, fruit and vegetables in the middle, and 8-11 servings of bread, rice, pasta and other grains at the bottom. It was updated to “My Plate” under the Obama administration.
The new guidelines are laid out on a new website, realfood.gov.
Federal health leaders including Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Marty Makary, Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Administrator Mehmet Oz and Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins joined White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt in a press briefing to present the new dietary guidelines, the first White House press briefing of 2026.
Focus on whole foods
“Diets rich in vegetables and fruits reduce disease risk more effectively than many drugs,” Kennedy said. “All grains outperform refined carbohydrates. Added sugars, especially sugar-sweetened beverages, drive metabolic disease, and today, our government declares war on added sugar, highly processed foods loaded with additives, added sugar and excess salt.”
Rollins said these guidelines will apply to whole foods whether they are “fresh, frozen, canned or dried.”
“These new guidelines are going to update the food that is served to America’s children in our public schools to the plates that are served to our great men in uniform, in our military, our veterans, in the food that they are consuming at the VA, and these new guidelines are also going to impact nutritional programs for the needy in our country, such as WIC and Head Start,” Leavitt said, adding that the guidelines would help Americans save “thousands” on groceries.
The new Dietary Guidelines for Americans (DGA) emphasize “nutrient dense foods,” highlighting alternative choices for common groceries, such as choosing plain shredded wheat cereal in place of frosted options or buying low-sodium canned black beans instead of regular ones.
According to Mollie Van Lieu, vice president of International Fresh Produce Association, the guidance on produce appeared to remain relatively unchanged.
“The science has always supported the importance of eating fruits and vegetables,” Van Lieu said, adding that more specific fruit and vegetable subgroups would have been one area her group would have wanted to see more on.
What changed, what didn’t
Although Kennedy repeatedly spoke in favor of eating more saturated fats, reiterating his aim of ending the “war on saturated fats,” the guidelines notably did not deviate from the long-held guidance to limit saturated fat consumption to 10 percent of daily intake, similarly maintaining the 10 percent limit for added sugars.
The DGA also “does not recommend that individuals who do not drink alcohol start drinking for any reason.”
When Kennedy was asked about the disparity in his rhetoric on saturated fats and what ultimately made it into the DGA, Makary jumped in and claimed that prior conclusions linking saturated fats to heart attack, noting the example of former President Eisenhower, were never substantiated.
“In this new guide, guidance, we are telling young people, kids, schools — you don’t need to tiptoe around fat and dairy. You don’t need to push low-fat milk to kids, and we are maintaining the 10 percent of calories as saturated fat in the guidance,” Makary said. “The real issue is protein. The fact that 60 to 70 percent of the calories of kids today in America is ultra-processed food — these are the issues that have become giant blind spots where we’re not putting attention.”
During the press briefing Wednesday, Oz also offered clarification when it came to alcohol, saying, “There is alcohol on these dietary guidelines, but the implication is don’t have it for breakfast.”
Industry reactions
Health groups called the new guidelines a “mixed bag,” with one major organization claiming they showed evidence of industry influence.
“The Guidelines are right to limit cholesterol-raising saturated (‘bad’) fat,” Neal Barnard, president of the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, said in a statement. “But they should spell out where it comes from: dairy products and meat, primarily. And here the Guidelines err in promoting meat and dairy products, which are principal drivers of cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and obesity.”
The guidelines do note saturated fats come from full-fat dairy products such as whole milk, ice cream and cheese and do suggest choosing low-fat or no-fat versions for those products.
While not specifying a certain percentage, Rollins noted eating more whole foods would include eating “more protein, dairy, more healthy fats.” The dairy industry welcomed the guidelines.
The International Dairy Foods Association said it “applauds HHS and USDA for grounding the 2025–2030 DGA in today’s nutrition science, including the evidence showing that dairy products at all fat levels support healthy eating patterns.”
“Recommending the consumption of whole and full-fat dairy products such as whole milk, yogurt, cheese, and other dairy products is an important victory for consumer choice and public health. Americans can now enjoy the wholesome dairy foods that work for their cultural, dietary and lifestyle preferences knowing that they are benefitting from dairy’s unique nutrient profile,” the organization added.
Farm Action, an advocacy and watchdog nonprofit group led by farmers, called the guidelines “encouraging.”
“The federal government is the largest purchaser of food in the country, and these guidelines influence what schools, the military, and other institutions buy with public dollars. That purchasing power shapes the markets farmers depend on,” Angela Huffman, president of Farm Action, said in a statement.
Updated at 4:10 p.m. EST
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Joseph Choi and The Hill
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