{"id":88583,"date":"2026-01-16T14:53:06","date_gmt":"2026-01-16T14:53:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/88583\/"},"modified":"2026-01-16T14:53:06","modified_gmt":"2026-01-16T14:53:06","slug":"pennsylvania-dairy-farmers-celebrate-the-whole-milk-act","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/88583\/","title":{"rendered":"Pennsylvania dairy farmers celebrate the Whole Milk Act"},"content":{"rendered":"

HARRISBURG, Pennsylvania \u2014 When word reached the dairy farmers gathered at the Pennsylvania<\/a> Farm Show that President Donald Trump<\/a> had signed the Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act<\/a>, cheers echoed through the cavernous 24-acre complex packed with farmers, thousands of attendees, and even a few goats, cows, and horses.<\/p>\n

No one was more exuberant at the news than Dave Smith, executive director of the Pennsylvania Dairymen\u2019s Association, a trade group founded in the late 19th century that supports and advocates the state\u2019s largest agricultural sector: dairy farming.<\/p>\n

Less than 10 minutes before the announcement, Smith had been telling me that getting whole milk back into schools was dairy farmers\u2019 biggest challenge and worry. That calm composure vanished as soon as word began to spread.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is incredible news,\u201d Smith said. \u201cI, and many others, have been working on the whole milk thing for many, many years, and this is meaningful for us in the dairy industry.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

It is a fight that has been going on since 2015, explained Rep. GT Thompson (R-PA), chairman of the House Agriculture Committee and a tireless advocate for the Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act since the United States Department of Agriculture mandated that milk offered in schools be fat-free or low-fat.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThose guidelines eliminated whole milk from schools,\u201d Thompson said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe impact on the American dairy farm was devastating,\u201d he explained, noting that overall U.S. milk consumption has declined dramatically.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s important for the nutrition of our youth. It\u2019s important for a huge commodity, the largest agriculture commodity in Pennsylvania, still is dairy, and it\u2019s all across the nation. And it\u2019s important for rural communities who lost so many businesses when dairy farms left and went out of business because we\u2019ve lost since 2012 two generations of milk drinkers,\u201d said Thompson, who is widely credited with rallying lawmakers on both the left and right to pass the bill on a bipartisan basis.<\/p>\n

Thompson said we were basically feeding children chalk water, \u201cwhich had very little nutritional benefits, if any. And so I\u2019m just thrilled. Thrilled to have the president\u2019s signature was the final stop, and really honored to have his support.\u201d<\/p>\n

At the 110th Pennsylvania Farm Show, the Pennsylvania Dairymen\u2019s Association reigns supreme, even among visitors who know little about agriculture but never miss its famous, creamy milkshakes. To mark the 250th this year, the group is offering a red, white, and blue milkshake flight.<\/p>\n

Smith said the iconic milkshakes have been a Farm Show staple for 72 years, made possible by hundreds of young volunteers. The proceeds go back into the industry\u2019s future, funding scholarships, youth programs, hunger prevention, and Future Farmers of America career development.<\/p>\n

Trump signed the bipartisan legislation in the Oval Office surrounded by children and dairy farmers, including a Butler, Pennsylvania, farmer who enables schools to offer whole milk again under the federal nutrition programs.<\/p>\n

The measure dovetails with newly released dietary guidelines that once again recognize full-fat dairy as part of a healthy dietary pattern, according to Dr. Mehmet Oz.<\/p>\n

Oz, who leads the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, was in the Oval Office for the signing with Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., and a bipartisan group of lawmakers headed by Thompson. Oz said the change supports both American families and the dairy producers who supply them.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis has been an event 15 years in the making. There has been generally agreed-upon science that whole-fat milk is actually a relatively healthy thing to drink, especially compared to skim milk,\u201d said Oz.<\/p>\n

Oz said science had been distorted in a way that convinced Americans that whole milk was unhealthy. He said the shift may have been well-intentioned, but it ended up driving policy to strip fat out of milk as if fat itself were toxic.<\/p>\n

Oz said children don\u2019t like watered-down milk. \u201cPlus, it\u2019s like all sugar because you\u2019ve taken all the fat out. So, then they add chocolate syrup to it to make it palatable, and it is even worse, and calorically, it\u2019s the same as whole-fat milk, so you don\u2019t even get a benefit,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI bring this up to say that once the dietary guidelines came out and we took on the big fat lie, it became easier for the Congress to say, well, now that we know that whole fat\u2019s good for you, taken obviously in moderation, then we can actually let kids drink whole fat milk again,\u201d he explained.<\/p>\n

The speed of this, Oz said, is a reflection of how the administration tackles problems aggressively and gets to the finish line. \u201cSo many times these things start, but they sputter; no one\u2019s got passion behind it.\u201d<\/p>\n

EOS ENERGY ANNOUNCES BREAKTHROUGH IN BATTERY STORAGE<\/a><\/p>\n

Trump, for his part, appeared to enjoy the moment at the signing, surrounded by the members of Congress who pushed the bill over the finish line, along with families and children.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhether you\u2019re a Democrat or a Republican, whole milk is a great thing,\u201d Trump said at the signing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"HARRISBURG, Pennsylvania \u2014 When word reached the dairy farmers gathered at the Pennsylvania Farm Show that President Donald…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":88584,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[2470,30052,34,43992,28,30,29],"class_list":["post-88583","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pennsylvania","tag-agriculture","tag-department-of-agriculture","tag-donald-trump","tag-dr-mehmet-oz","tag-pennsylvania","tag-pennsylvania-headlines","tag-pennsylvania-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/88583","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=88583"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/88583\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/88584"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=88583"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=88583"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=88583"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}