Raw Milk Stories Ignore Studies on Unpasteurized Benefits
October 18, 2026By Pete Kennedy, Esq.
North Dakota–Loss of Food Freedom Advocate
North Dakota lost a champion of food freedom when LeAnn Harner died this past winter. She was 66. Harner was instrumental in helping the state pass some of the most favorable food freedom laws in the U.S. She played a key part in the passage of a 2013 bill, legalizing herdshare agreements; until that time, any sale or distribution of raw milk for human consumption was illegal. She was the driving force behind the 2017 North Dakota Food Freedom Act, successful legislation that gave North Dakota one of the best cottage food laws in the country. She later worked with the Institute for Justice to stop an attempt by the state health department to narrow the scope of that law.
In 2023 she worked in support of legislation that legalized raw milk sales. She also helped in a 2025 effort that expanded sales to include all raw dairy products. A skilled organizer and educator, she taught classes in cheesemaking, among other topics, and operated a goat herdshare dairy at her farm in Oliver County. She spent many days at the state capital in Bismarck effectively working for legislation that has benefited thousands of North Dakotans. She will be greatly missed.
Oklahoma–Senate Bill 2028 Now Law
On May 7, Oklahoma expanded its law on the sale of raw milk and raw milk products when Governor Kevin Stitt signed Senate Bill 2028 (SB 2028) into law. Prior law limited the sale of raw milk to an average of one hundred gallons per month; SB 2028 increases that to fifteen hundred.
The bill also allows the sale of any raw milk product; all sales of raw milk and raw milk products must be direct to consumer and take place on the farm where the raw milk is produced. The raw milk container must have a warning label which, among other things, must notify the consumer that the raw milk or raw milk product is not licensed, regulated or inspected and that the raw milk or raw milk product “may contain harmful bacteria that can cause serious illness.” The Oklahoma Department of Agriculture, Food and Forestry is charged with issuing regulations on the requirements for the content on the warning label.
SB 2028 continues a couple of trends regarding raw dairy bills that have passed in recent years. The bills have all contained little or no regulation for sales of raw milk and raw milk products. For the most part, public health officials still do not believe raw milk can be produced safely but, with the overwhelming demand for the product, instead of successfully opposing bills like they have in the past, they would rather not have the legislation give them the responsibility of regulating raw dairy. The second trend is that states are increasing the number of raw dairy products other than milk that are legal to sell. The dairy processors lobby once strongly opposed legalized sales of raw milk products other than cheese but, like the public health agencies, have reduced their opposition to raw dairy sales.
SB 2028 went into effect on passage. After Utah Senate Bill 179 (see Wise Traditions 2026 spring issue for background), SB 2028 became the second raw milk bill to pass into law in 2026.
California–FDA Piles on Raw Farm
Lifting the interstate raw milk ban remains a bad idea. The record of the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) harassing businesses producing raw cheese (aged 60 days or more) is well documented in Catherine Donnelly’s book, The War on Artisan Cheese. It’s the one raw dairy product that the agency does have jurisdiction over. FDA provided further evidence of why the interstate prohibition on raw milk for direct human consumption is actually a blessing in disguise, with its recent treatment of Fresno-based Raw Farm, the largest raw dairy in the world.
On March 15, FDA issued a press release stating that it and the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) were investigating a multi-state foodborne illness outbreak attributed to the consumption of Raw Farm cheddar (eventually the Feds claimed the cheese sickened eleven people) from September 1, 2025, to February 13, 2026. FDA’s problem in making this claim is that Raw Farm is the only dairy in the world that operates an on-farm pathogen testing lab. Mark McAfee, president of Raw Farm, said that from September 2025 to March 2026, fourteen thousand tests were conducted at the lab—all tests of raw milk were negative for pathogens. A handful of negative pathogen tests aren’t necessarily dispositive about whether a food made someone sick, but what about fourteen thousand?
For its part, FDA stated that it collected and analyzed nineteen samples of raw cheese, with one sample testing positive for E. coli 0157:H7; a problem for the agency was that the strain of E. coli 0157:H7 found in the sample was not the same strain as the one blamed for the illnesses. McAfee said the positive sample wasn’t tested for release; Raw Farm has a test-and-hold policy where no product is marketed until it first tests negative for pathogens.
Instead of absolving Raw Farm of blame, FDA doubled down and claimed the strain it found was linked to a 2025 outbreak sickening three people. The problem for the agency this time was that none of the sick people reported consuming raw cheese. McAfee also said that whole genome sequencing, the current “gold standard” for pathogen testing by public health agencies, is “a horrible tool for making conclusionary statements about the cause of an outbreak.”
With the pressure FDA was putting on the dairy, McAfee issued a voluntary recall of the company’s raw cheese on April 17. On April 30, CDC announced its investigation was over but its final press release did not specifically exonerate Raw Farm for the 2026 outbreak while at the same time indicating it had no evidence linking the dairy to the illnesses—again, three of the eleven people allegedly sickened by the outbreak reported that they did not consume raw cheese.
McAfee was confident about the reason for FDA harassment; commenting on a blog post by David Gumpert, McAfee wrote, “The FDA has told us on several occasions over the last 18 months (and again in person 10 days ago) that “Raw Farm is the last retail raw cheese regulated by the FDA that does not pasteurize the cheese and label it as raw!!” They demand that we do the same!! We have told them NO. We believe that this request amounts to consumer fraud and is very misleading and constitutes misbranding. We refuse!”
Under the current federal regulations, manufacturers can heat cheese at 150 degrees and label their product as “raw.” The goal of career bureaucrats at FDA to get all truly raw cheese off the market hasn’t changed.
SOURCE: McAfee, Mark. (2026, April 17). Comment on “Here’s the Likely Reason Raw Farm Is Getting So Many People Sick.” (Blog). DavidGumpert.com, April 14, 2026. https://www.davidgumpert.com/heres-the-likely-reasonraw-farm-is-getting-so-many-people-sick
