Suddenly, Roundup is everywhere. Literally!
Monsanto’s flagship weed killer (active ingredient: glyphosate) was all over the headlines this past week, seeping into the feeds of wellness influencers and the screeds of the Make America Healthy Again folks who rallied outside the Supreme Court—joined by Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.)—to express their disdain for the chemical and its maker.
The court heard oral arguments Monday in a case whose outcome could determine the fate of thousands of lawsuits and billions of dollars in legal settlements. At issue is whether Bayer, which acquired Monsanto, can be held liable for failing to disclose that scientists have linked its product to non-Hodgkin lymphoma (a type of cancer) and other ailments, even though the EPA never required such disclosures.
As Lee Hedgepeth writes for Inside Climate News, “The justices appeared friendly to Monsanto’s argument that states like Missouri are prohibited by federal law from allowing [such] lawsuits.”
Republicans also tried—and failed—to squeeze a liability shield for Bayer into the farm bill the House passed Thursday after Massie and another MAHA-friendly Republican had their language stripped. The pro-Roundup effort may have stemmed from an executive order President Donald Trump issued in February declaring that America must safeguard, and even boost, glyphosate production.
But assessments of glyphosate by the EPA and other state and federal agencies have relied partly on scientific papers secretly funded and even ghostwritten by Monsanto as part of a Big Tobacco–style campaign to convince regulators Roundup is safe. Reporter Nate Halverson covers that sordid history as part of a multimedia investigation that also dropped last week. In his Mother Jones feature story, a Reveal radio hour, and a short documentary, he details how Monsanto meddled with the scientific process—and how, largely unbeknownst to the public, companies and agencies are spraying increasing amounts of glyphosate in our state and national forests.
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—Michael Mechanic
