The Fox News host claims that people in Europe “don’t gain weight” from eating pasta

Fox News host Ainsley Earhardt pointed out that pasta and pizza in Europe are lower in calories than in the United States and claimed that people “don’t gain weight” when they eat these products abroad because they don’t contain “pesticides” like their American products contain counterparts.

During a long and casual news conference Monday, President-elect Donald Trump reiterated his support for vaccine skeptic Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as his Health and Human Services secretary. He also lent credence to Kennedy’s debunked claims that vaccinations cause autism in children.

At the same time, the new president tried to allay fears that Kennedy was advocating phasing out the polio vaccine. “You will not lose the polio vaccine. “That’s not going to happen,” Trump said, adding that he was a “big fan” of vaccinations. Still, the president-elect signaled that he could make vaccinations and other immunizations a parent’s decision.

“I don’t like mandates. I’m not a big mandate person,” he said when asked about schools requiring vaccinations for children.

When the new president reaffirmed Kennedy’s so-called “Make America Healthy Again” agenda, which would eliminate pesticides in agriculture and promote organic food in school lunches, Earhardt was excited about the prospect of Kennedy in the new Trump administration, even though she believed that Maybe I was confused about pasta.

“It’s obvious who we like! We’re all thrilled for him,” she said on Monday’s show Outnumbered citing a recent Fox News poll that found a majority of American voters supported Kennedy’s nomination.

“How wonderful is it that we might not have to worry about our children having autism or getting cancer,” Earhardt continued, apparently parroting Kennedy’s claim about the root causes of autism. “It’s wonderful that he wants to clean up our food!” (Especially when former First Lady Michelle Obama launched an initiative to make school lunches healthier in 2010, conservatives and Fox News labeled it “communism.”)

In order to enforce their case, the Fox & friends The co-host then compared the quality of food in Europe to that in America. However, she made a strange claim – especially given her high-carb diet.

“When we go to Europe, we can eat pasta, we can eat pizza, we don’t gain weight,” she explained. “I know you walk a lot, but you don’t gain weight. You feel fresh. You feel clean.”

Earhardt added that once a person returns to America and “starts eating pasta again,” they “immediately gain weight.” According to the Fox News morning host, there was a simple reason why spaghetti was said to be less fattening across the pond than in the US.

“There is something wrong with our food. It’s the pesticides, it’s the chemicals. We want all of this out,” she concluded.

The Fox News star’s claim that people in Europe can eat as much pasta and pizza as they want without packing on pounds, based on the assumption that the food is pesticide-free, caused quite a stir on social media ridicule.

“We are one step away from Brawndo having what plants crave.” Washington Monthly Political editor Bill Scher snarked, referring to the 2006 satire Idiocracy . He wasn’t the only one to link her comments to the comedic film about a dystopian future in which civilization has evolved.

Others mocked Earhardt for associating insect-killing chemicals with lower-fat foods. “There are lower calorie pesticides in Italy,” Gizmodo tech reporter Matt Novak told Bluesky.

Meanwhile, other critics said that while Earhardt’s comments were ridiculous, it would be good if the United States followed other countries’ lead and pushed for more regulations on produce and livestock.

“We should laugh at it, of course, but it would be a fantastic thing for all of us if our agricultural laws were even a little bit as strict as Europe’s,” said Ilhan Omar’s former spokesman Isi Baehr-Breen.