The claim: Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said all GMOs will be banned in the US on Jan. 20
A Dec. 13 Instagram post (direct link, archive link) shows an X post purportedly from Robert F. Kennedy Jr., President-elect Donald Trump’s nominee for Health and Human Services secretary.
“BREAKING: Effective January 20th, all Genetically Modified Organisms – GMOs – will be BANNED in the United States,” reads text in the image, which is a screenshot of a post by @RFKJrHealthSec on X.
The Instagram post was liked more than 26,000 times in nearly three weeks.
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Our rating: False
The purported post by Kennedy originated from a parody account. There is no evidence of such a post on Kennedy’s legitimate X account, nor are there any credible news reports that support the claim.
Post came from parody account, not Kennedy’s
Kennedy has called for banning hundreds of food additives and chemicals, such as food dyes, and revisiting the use of pesticides in agriculture, as USA TODAY previously reported. He has also been critical of genetically modified crops in the past, according to multiple news reports and social media posts.
But the screenshot in the Instagram post doesn’t show a legitimate X post from Kennedy. Rather, it originated from a parody account that was suspended as of Jan. 2.
Kennedy’s X account is @RobertKennedyJr, not @RFKJrHealthSec, and there is no mention of such a ban on genetically modified crops in his posts. Nothing similar is mentioned in Kennedy’s other social media accounts or credible news reports.
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It’s an example of what could be called “stolen satire,” where content written as satire and presented that way originally is captured via screenshot and reposted in a way that makes it appear to be legitimate. As a result, readers of the second-generation post are misled, as was the case here.
The Food and Drug Administration says the term genetically modified organism refers to any “plant, animal or microorganism that has had its genetic material altered through a process called genetic engineering.” While GMO foods have stirred controversy in the past, the FDA says they’re carefully studied before being sold to the public and are as healthy and safe as their non-GMO counterparts.
USA TODAY has previously debunked other fake posts attributed to Kennedy, including another from the @RFKJrHealthSec account.
USA TODAY reached out to the social media user who shared the post for comment but did not immediately receive a response.
PolitiFact and Reuters also debunked the claim.
Our fact-check sources
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Robert F. Kennedy Jr, accessed Jan. 2, X profile
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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: No, RFK Jr. didn’t post about Jan. 20 GMO ban | Fact check
