In March 2023, Florida lawmakers passed a bill that would make it a misdemeanor to develop or sell lab-grown meat. The initiative joined a growing number of similar efforts from conservative lawmakers around the country, with lawmakers in Alabama, Arizona and Tennessee all introducing similar bills. Other states, like Montana, North Dakota and Wyoming, have passed bills banning the products (also called “cultured meat” or “cultivated meat”) from being labeled as “meat” at all — a cause that’s been taken up by senators at a federal level, many of whom are also advocating to ban lab meat from school lunch programs and federal food procurement.
Objections to cultivated meat have been varied, with politicians citing concern for U.S. ranchers, questions about health and safety and, increasingly, conspiracy theories about attempts to control the U.S. food supply. The idea that powerful actors want to take meat away from Americans echoes previous claims that the Green New Deal — a proposed package of climate policies that suggested reducing agricultural emissions — was an attempt “to take away your hamburgers.”
