The New Dietary Guidelines and the “Flipped Pyramid”

A case study in propaganda, revisionism, and rebranding

Last week, the Trump administration released the 2025–2030 Dietary Guidelines for Americans. In the months leading up to their release, there was a lot of speculation about what they would include, largely because the administration very publicly rejected the original scientific advisory committee’s report, which was a two-year review conducted by 20 independent experts, in favor of what they kept describing as a short, easy-to-read, “common sense” document produced by an at-the-time unknown group.

Given RFK Jr.’s and the MAHA movement’s long-standing embrace of wellness pseudoscience and hostility toward consensus nutrition science, many of us in the field were bracing for what would come next.

But interestingly, despite all of the noise, many of the core recommendations in the new guidelines are not a dramatic departure from previous dietary guidance. They still promote nutrient-dense foods, appropriate calorie intake and portion sizes. They still recommend prioritizing fruits and vegetables. They still recommend whole grains. They still recommend a variety of protein sources from both animals and plants. They still recommend limiting added sugars and sodium. And they still recommend keeping saturated fat below 10% of total calories.

Which raises the obvious question. If the substance is not radically different, why has the messaging been so extreme and misleading?

The resurrection of a pyramid that hasn’t existed in 21 years

The first time I heard someone invoke the 1992 Food Guide Pyramid as evidence of intentional public health malpractice was in 2024, when Calley Means went on Tucker Carlson’s show and claimed that the pyramid was “an ultra-processed food marketing document” and that Americans shifted their diets toward ultra-processed foods as a result of that food guide pyramid.

I made a response video in September 2024 explaining why that claim was false on multiple levels.

First, the 1992 pyramid did not promote ultra-processed foods. It recommended grains, fruits, vegetables, animal and plant proteins, and dairy. It emphasized variety and moderation. And it explicitly placed fats and added sugars at the top with a clear “use sparingly” label. Now, 35 years later, there are certainly valid criticisms and areas where updated science warranted change. But that is exactly what happened with MyPyramid in 2005 and then MyPlate in 2011, which this administration is now pretending never existed.

Second, Americans did not suddenly start eating ultra-processed foods because of the food pyramid (I can’t even believe I have to type out that sentence). The rise in ultra-processed food consumption started in the post–World War II period, accelerating sharply from the 1970s onward, particularly in the 1980s and 1990s, driven by corporate consolidation, agricultural policy, advances in food formulation science, aggressive marketing, and the rapid expansion of fast food and packaged snack foods. Over time, this reshaped the entire food environment where today, roughly 70% of the U.S. food supply consists of ultra-processed, pre-packaged products, and grocery stores, convenience stores, schools, and workplaces are structurally dominated by these foods. That reality, combined with time scarcity, cost constraints, marketing saturation, and uneven access to fresh foods, has for decades made it extremely difficult for most Americans to follow evidence-based nutrition guidance. This is why, historically, almost no Americans have ever eaten in close alignment with the dietary guidelines, from the original Food Pyramid through MyPlate. The guidelines did not create this food environment. They have always existed within it.

When I made that original response video, I was genuinely confused as to why this narrative was being pushed. It made no sense historically or scientifically. But that confusion cleared up over the next year.

Over and over again, whether it was RFK Jr., Dr. Oz, Dr. Marty Makary, or President Trump himself, administration officials referred to the dietary guidelines as “the food pyramid.” Not MyPlate. Not the 2010 or 2015 or 2020 guidelines. The food pyramid. A visual that has not been used in over two decades.

For anyone who actually works in nutrition, this was bizarre. We have been using MyPlate since 2011. For sixteen years. The plate is what has been taught in schools, used in federal nutrition programs, printed on educational materials, and referenced in clinical guidance.

It would be like an administration repeatedly criticizing the iPhone 4 (circa 2010), teasing that their new cell phone release was going to be so much better and more innovative than the iPhone 4, while pretending the iPhone 5-17 just never happened.

It felt like historical revisionism. Because it was.

Why the propaganda suddenly made sense

When HHS and USDA released their new visual last week, the entire strategy became extremely clear.

Because along with their scientific report and their dietary guidelines, they unveiled an inverted food pyramid. Animal meat and vegetables at the top. Whole grains at the bottom. A scattering of other foods in between. A visual that is neither intuitive nor aligned with the written portion of their actual dietary guidelines.

And suddenly, a year of nonsensical food pyramid rhetoric made sense.

I imagine "we flipped the pyramid" is much better manipulative marketing than "we replaced a clear, intuitive, nutritionally balanced plate with an inverted pyramid."

It would be hard to market a “reset” if the public understood what the previous guidelines actually said. So instead, they’re just pretending MyPlate never existed.

Which is evident right at the top of the new dietary guidelines website, which opens with the 1992 food pyramid and the words “For decades we've been misled by guidance that prioritized highly processed food, and are now facing rates of unprecedented chronic disease.” This is, of course, inaccurate and textbook historical revisionism. It takes thirty years of complex nutrition policy and turns it into a simple bad guy, pins America’s health crisis on a graphic that has not been used in two decades, and lets the actual causes of chronic disease completely off the hook.

The guidelines themselves are largely familiar

If you actually read the 2025–2030 Dietary Guidelines, much of it will sound… familiar. They recommend eating an appropriate number of calories for your needs, paying attention to portion sizes, and staying hydrated. That has always been there. They recommend eating a variety of fruits and vegetables. Since 2011, the official guidance has been to make half your plate fruits and vegetables. They recommend fiber-rich whole grains. Previous guidelines did the same. They recommend a variety of protein sources from both animal and plant foods. Again, not new. They recommend limiting added sugars and sodium. Not new. They recommend keeping saturated fat under 10% of total calories. Exactly the same as previous guidelines.

They even use the same language about nutrient-dense foods that they are now presenting as if it were some bold philosophical shift.

For anyone who wants a truly thorough, evidence-based walkthrough of what is actually in the new guidelines, how they compare to previous versions, and where the science does and does not support the changes, I highly recommend Kevin Klatt’s Substack on this, as I am not trying to replicate that level of technical review here.

What I am interested in is what happens when you put their words next to their visual. Because that is where things start to fall apart.

As an example, the written guidelines, like previous versions, say to consume a variety of protein sources from both animal and plant foods, including beans, lentils, legumes, soy, nuts, and seeds. This is uncontroversial, in line with the previous dietary guidelines, and in line with global nutrition consensus.

And yet, their consumer-facing visual places animal meat and fat at the very top of the inverted pyramid, with plant proteins largely absent. The obvious takeaway for anyone looking at that image is to eat a lot of animal protein.

But that is not what their written guidance says. And it is not what the evidence supports.

The same contradiction shows up with fat. The guidelines still recommend keeping saturated fat under 10% of total calories, exactly as previous guidelines did, and in line with global scientific consensus. And yet, the visual heavily emphasizes animal fats, which is unreasonably confusing and makes no sense. You cannot meaningfully prioritize animal fats while simultaneously telling people to limit saturated fat. Those two messages are in direct tension.

Ultimately, the text largely aligns, with some important exceptions, with modern nutrition science. The image aligns with MAHA aesthetics, carnivore-adjacent messaging, and strong meat and dairy industry lobbying wins.

We’ve seen this a lot with RFK Jr. over the last year as he tries to balance the pseudoscientific beliefs he built this MAHA movement on with actual reality. He seems to be keeping the science just intact enough to remain defensible on paper, while using the visual language to signal something else entirely. He suggests that we have had a “war on saturated fats,” while keeping the actual recommendation at less than 10% of total calories.

It creates the appearance of a paradigm shift without actually making one, while distracting from the structural realities of our food environment and the fact that most Americans are not in a position to follow the dietary guidelines at all.

The problem has never been the guidance

The problem, of course, has never been that Americans were confused or misled by the food pyramid. The problem is that our food environment is engineered around ultra-processed, shelf-stable, aggressively marketed products. The problem is that fresh, minimally processed foods are more expensive, less accessible, more time-intensive, and less available in many communities. The problem is that wages have stagnated, housing costs have exploded, childcare is unaffordable, and time scarcity is the norm. The problem is that our agricultural, trade, and food policies have prioritized commodity production and corporate profit over public health for decades.

No visual or dietary guidance can overcome that, as four decades of data have made painfully clear.

Flipping a pyramid does not change what is stocked in corner stores or served in schools. It does not change what is affordable for families on SNAP. It does not change what is heavily marketed to children. It does not change what is available in rural food deserts or urban food swamps. And it does not change the fact that roughly 70% of the U.S. food supply is now ultra-processed, pre-packaged foods.

So when this administration frames the dietary guidelines as a bold reset, or suggests that previous guidance is the reason Americans are sick, it is both inaccurate and strategically convenient. It shifts responsibility away from corporate power, regulatory failure, and structural inequality and places it onto individual choice and a long-retired graphic.

What makes this moment so frustrating is the wasted opportunity. There is real energy right now around food, health, and chronic disease. People are paying attention, asking questions, and are hungry for change.

We could be using this moment to truly improve the food environment. To invest in access to fresh, minimally processed foods. To strengthen school meals. To expand SNAP education and incentive programs like Double Up Food Bucks, which we know improve diet quality. To support small and regional producers. To regulate marketing to children. To address the concentration of corporate power in the food system. To support scientists and fund nutrition science research. To expand access to preventive care and integrate registered dietitians into primary care. To invest in community-based nutrition programs. To make it easier, not harder, for people to eat in ways that support their health.

Instead, we are watching political theater. We are watching a visual rebrand sold as some revolutionary health win. We are watching historical revisionism. And we are watching the language of health used to advance ideology, protect corporate interests, and distract from structural failure.

This is what makes the propaganda so damaging. Not only is it misleading, but it’s distracting. It absorbs public attention and political capital that could be used to address the actual drivers of diet-related disease.

And that is the most unsettling part. A moment of real public attention and political energy is being squandered while people who genuinely want better food systems and improved health outcomes are celebrating misguided marketing messages meant to distract them. Real progress in public health comes from policy, investment, and structural change. And until we are willing to address the systems that actually shape how people eat, no graphic, no guideline, and no amount of wellness language will move the needle.

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