Here is an article about the details of one of Trump's dirty deals, and the dirty secrets of cane sugar.
--Kim
The truth is I rarely drink Coke or any other soda. But maybe twice a year I might end up in a situation where I drink one and it will be a Mexican Coke. Not because I think there's much difference between sugar and high fructose corn syrup - but I just think it tastes better.
So when Trump tried to distract his way out of the Epstein Files by saying he convinced Coca-Cola to switch to sugar - I thought - "Cool. Anyway."
Then a comment sent me down another Trump rabbit hole. Turns out there's a reason behind this push that has nothing to do with making America healthier and everything to do with lining the pockets of his wealthy Mar-a-Lago neighbor.
Meet José 'Pepe' Fanjul - the Cuban-American sugar baron worth $8.2 billion who owns a massive sugar plantation in the Dominican Republic. The same plantation that was banned from exporting to the U.S. in 2022 for using forced labor. Only to have Trump quietly lift that ban earlier this year.
Central Romana Corporation - partly owned by the Fanjul family - has been the subject of decades of allegations about horrific working conditions. Workers, mostly Haitian migrants, live in company-controlled camps called bateyes, often without electricity or running water. They work thirteen-hour days cutting sugar cane with machetes for poverty wages. The U.S. banned their sugar in 2022 after finding evidence of forced labor, wage theft, and abusive conditions.
The Fanjul brothers have donated millions to politicians on both sides of the aisle. Pepe, the Republican donor, threw his support behind Trump while his brother Alfonso traditionally backs Democrats. Classic hedge-your-bets strategy that's paid off spectacularly.
After Trump's inauguration, those forced labor sanctions mysteriously disappeared. In March 2025, U.S. Customs and Border Protection quietly lifted the import ban on Central Romana's sugar - despite labor rights groups insisting that working conditions hadn't significantly improved. The timing wasn't coincidental.
Now Trump is pushing Coca-Cola to use "real" cane sugar instead of high-fructose corn syrup. Coca-Cola announced this week they'll release a cane sugar version this fall. Guess where that sugar might come from?
The whole thing reads like textbook crony capitalism. Trump lifts sanctions on his buddy's plantation, then pressures major corporations to buy that same sugar. Meanwhile, he frames it as part of his "Make America Healthy Again" initiative.
High-fructose corn syrup probably isn't great for you. But this isn't about health. If Trump actually cared about American wellness, he wouldn't be enabling a company that allegedly uses forced labor to produce its sugar.
The Fanjul connection runs deeper than just business. Pepe Fanjul also appears in Jeffrey Epstein's infamous "black book" of contacts. Photos show Pepe socializing with Epstein at various events. While this doesn't prove wrongdoing, it does illustrate the interconnected web of wealthy people who move in the same circles.
As it turns out - the sugar industry has gamed the system for decades. Here's how it works - the U.S. government doesn't write checks to sugar producers. Instead, they've created this elaborate shell game where import quotas and tariffs keep cheap foreign sugar out of the country. With no competition, domestic sugar producers can charge whatever they want - about twice the world market price. It's like having a monopoly handed to you by the government. The Fanjul brothers pocket an estimated $65 million annually in extra profits that wouldn't exist if Americans could just buy sugar at normal prices from whoever offers the best deal.
If you've ever wondered about why other country's have such high tariffs on US products - well - it works both ways. They are also trying to protect their own homegrown industries. And most of these countries are a LOT smaller than the US - so opening up their markets to us could have very dire effects on their economies.
Unsurprisingly, the corn industry isn't thrilled about Trump's sugar push. The Corn Refiners Association has warned that switching from corn syrup to cane sugar would cost thousands of American manufacturing jobs and increase foreign sugar imports. They're right to be concerned - Trump is essentially picking winners and losers based on political connections rather than market forces.
This is exactly the kind of swamp behavior Trump claimed he'd drain. Instead, he's created new tributaries that flow directly to his friends' bank accounts. The forced labor ban disappears, the sugar lobby gets its wish, and American consumers get to pay premium prices for sugar that may have been produced under horrific conditions.
Trump is presenting this as a victory for American health while ignoring the human cost of that sugar production. Workers in Dominican Republic sugar camps don't get to celebrate this "win" - they're still trapped in conditions that U.S. investigators deemed forced labor just two years ago.
Meanwhile, Coca-Cola gets to play both sides. They can market their new cane sugar version as "natural" and "Trump-approved" while continuing to use corn syrup in their regular products. Brilliant corporate theater that obscures the ugly reality of how that sugar gets made.
But wait - there's more!
During this deep dive - I figured I might as well research if the sugar in so-called Mexican Coke is also problematic - and, of course, it is!
Mexican Coke uses cane sugar that's produced domestically in Mexico. Workers face extreme heat (often near 100°F/38°C) and lose over 5 pounds of water per day! Also, there's an epidemic of chronic kidney disease among sugar cane workers from repeated dehydration. They work long hours, with low pay, in dangerous working conditions including field burning. And unfortunately, Child labor also exists, particularly in states like Veracruz and Oaxaca, often involving migrant families.
So, while Mexican Coke's sugar isn't produced under the same forced labor conditions as the Dominican sugar that Trump just made legal again, it's still produced under pretty brutal working conditions with serious health consequences for workers. Unfortunately, neither sugar nor corn syrup is sweet enough to cover that bitter aftertaste.
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