California
Corn tortillas in California now must contain folic acid. More states are looking at it
Fifteen years after she lost her first baby to a rare and devastating birth defect, Andrea Lopez takes comfort in knowing that other Latina mothers might finally avoid the same pain.
In January, California became the first state to require food makers to add folic acid, a crucial vitamin, to corn masa flour used to make tortillas and other traditional foods widely used in her community.
It’s a long-delayed move aimed at reducing Hispanic infants’ disproportionately high rates of serious conditions called neural tube defects, which claimed Lopez’s son, Gabriel Cude, when he was 10 days old.
“It’s such a small effort for such a tremendous impact,” said Lopez, 44, who lives in Bakersfield and is now a lawyer with two young daughters. “There is very little that I wouldn’t do to spare anybody this heartache.”
A similar law takes effect in Alabama in June, and legislation is pending or being considered in Florida, Georgia, Oklahoma and Oregon. Four more states — Texas, Delaware, New Jersey and Pennsylvania — have expressed “active interest” in the issue, according to the Food Fortification Initiative, an advocacy group that focuses on addressing micronutrient deficiencies.
“All women and children in the United States should have access to folic acid and have healthy babies,” said Scott Montgomery, the group’s director.
Corn masa was excluded from a national mandate
For nearly 30 years, folic acid, a key B vitamin, has been required to be added to enriched wheat and white breads, cereals and pastas in the U.S.
Decades of research show the 1998 requirement cut rates of serious defects such as spina bifida and anencephaly by about 30%, preventing about 1,300 cases a year. It is regarded as one of the top public health triumphs of the 20th century.
But corn masa flour, a staple used in Latino diets, was left out of the original fortification requirement — and rates of conditions such as spina bifida and anencephaly in that community have remained stubbornly high.
In 2016, federal regulators allowed, but did not require, folic acid to be added to corn masa products. By 2023, only about 1 in 7 corn masa flour products and no corn tortillas contained folic acid, a review found.
Higher rates of birth defects among Hispanic moms
Nationwide, Hispanic women have the highest rates of having those defects during pregnancy. In California, the rate among Hispanic mothers is twice as high as for white or Black women, state data show.
California’s new law — and the state’s huge buying power — could help expand its adoption nationwide, said state Assemblymember Joaquin Arambula, who sponsored the legislation passed in 2024.
“You have to be the first oftentimes to get the ball rolling,” he said. “So, I’m glad other states have taken up that mantle.”
California’s action and pressure from advocates have already spurred changes.
Gruma Corp., the parent company of Mission Foods and Azteca Milling, has been involved in the fortification issue for nearly two decades. Azteca began selling some — but not all — varieties of Maseca, its largest brand of corn masa flour, with folic acid in 2016.
As of this year, 97% of the company’s retail sales in the U.S. include folic acid. The rest are expected to be fortified before July, Gruma said in a statement.
Mission Foods began fortification in 2024. It now adds folic acid to all of its branded and private label corn tortillas in the U.S.
Such actions by large producers have helped pave the way for smaller manufacturers to follow suit, according to a recent report by the Center for Science in the Public Interest, a consumer advocacy group that has pushed for fortification.
Initially, the industry was concerned folic acid could affect flavor and the cost of changing labels, said Jim Kabbani, head of the Tortilla Industry Association. But he now expects tortilla makers will start selling fortified products on a broader scale.
“I think overall the train has left the station and it will be more and more states,” he said.
Public health experts cheer the growing momentum.
“The science is clear: Folic acid fortification works,” said Vijaya Kancherla, an Emory University epidemiology professor and director of the Center for Spina Bifida Prevention. “It’s safe. It’s proven. And it’s cost-effective.”
RFK Jr. calls corn masa fortification ‘insanity’
That view contrasts sharply with critics — including some at the highest level of government — who regard fortification of the food supply as a form of government overreach.
Late last year, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. criticized California’s new law in a post on X: “This is insanity. California is waging war against her children — targeting the poor and communities of color,” he wrote.
A spokesman for Kennedy declined to explain the comments.
Social media feeds are rife with people claiming that folic acid fortification is “toxic” or that people with a certain gene variation known as MTHFR can’t properly process the vitamin.
None of those claims is accurate, according to advocates and medical experts.
“What’s truly insane is that our nation’s top health official is spreading false claims and frightening people into avoiding a nutrient that’s proven to prevent birth defects and save babies’ lives,” said Eva Greenthal, CSPI’s senior policy scientist.
At fortification doses, folic acid “has never been shown to harm individuals or populations,” said Dr. Jeffery Blount, a pediatric neurosurgeon at the University of Alabama at Birmingham who works to prevent neural tube defects in the U.S. and globally.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention emphasizes that “people with the MTHFR gene variant can process all types of folate, including folic acid.”
Even Kennedy’s new federal dietary guidelines support fortification. Documents backing the guidelines advise pregnant women to eat folate-rich foods, such as leafy green vegetables, beans and lentils. But they also acknowledge that folic acid from fortified foods or supplements is “critical” before conception and during early pregnancy to prevent neural tube defects.
“Folic acid fortification of corn masa flour could help prevent” neural tube defects, the CDC website adds.
Without fortification, ‘It’s just too late’
Neural tube defects, which affect about 2,000 babies each year in the U.S., occur in the first weeks after conception, when the tube that forms the spine and brain fails to develop properly.
That’s often before many women realize they’re pregnant. More than 40% of U.S. pregnancies are unintended. In those cases, many women won’t have been preparing for pregnancy, noted Dr. Kimberly BeDell, medical director of a rehabilitation clinic that helps children with spina bifida at Miller Children’s Hospital in Long Beach, California.
“Even women’s best efforts in going to an OB right away and starting prenatal vitamins, it’s just too late,” BeDell said.
Adding folic acid to corn masa, the way it is added to other grains, is a way to ensure the nutrient reaches the wider population that needs it, she added.
At age 28, pregnant with her first child, Andrea Lopez didn’t know about the importance of folic acid or that the vitamin might be missing from her diet.
Then, an ultrasound mid-way through pregnancy showed that her baby had anencephaly, a fatal condition in which the skull fails to develop properly.
Lopez carried the pregnancy to term and Gabriel lived for 10 days. The pain of his loss never goes away, she said, adding that Gabriel would have been a high school freshman this year. She supports California’s law requiring folic acid fortification of corn masa and finds it “mind-boggling” that the action took so long to enforce.
“Trust me, you don’t want to go through this,” she said. “He’s the love of my life. I have two little girls that survived, but he’s my first born. He is my only son.”
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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
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As the nation prepares for its 250th Independence Day celebration, a decades-long California Fourth of July fireworks tradition that has raised millions for local children’s programs is going dark this year after the California Coastal Commission rejected a final effort to keep it alive, citing environmental concerns to protect the bay.
“We’ve raised over the past 14 years $2 million for kids programs here in Long Beach,” event organizer John Morris told Fox News Digital, adding the July 3 event is fully funded by the local community.
“This community pays for everything — everything. City fees, and the city doesn’t give us a break. We pay $20,000 to the city for police and fire, which I’m fine with, because there’s 100,000 people enjoying the fireworks,” said Morris, a Long Beach resident and business owner.
Morris, who owns the Boathouse on the Bay restaurant, had planned a scaled-up fireworks display this year to mark America’s 250th Independence Day.
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Long Beach residents have enjoyed the fireworks organized by John Morris for over a decade. (Scott Varley/MediaNews Group/Torrance Daily Breeze via Getty Images)
In January, Coastal Commission staff rejected the proposal, and last week commissioners unanimously upheld that decision despite an appeal backed by local, state and federal officials.
Regulators warned Morris last year that 2025 would likely be the final year for fireworks at the event, as they continue pushing organizers to switch to drone shows they say are more environmentally friendly.
The decision stands in contrast to other approvals by the commission, including a permit granted to SeaWorld allowing up to 40 nights of fireworks.
“They get 40 nights in Mission Bay. All I’m asking for is 20 minutes — it doesn’t make any sense,” Morris said.
Morris, 78, also pushed back on the environmental concerns cited by the commission, pointing to years of testing around the event.
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Due to the lack of fireworks, Morris has decided to cancel the July 3rd celebration.
“We’ve had 10 years of environmental studies,” Morris said. “We test the water before and after the fireworks and send a robotic camera into the bay to check for debris — there’s never been any. It’s been spotless.
“We’ve also had eight years of bird reports to make sure we’re not harming wildlife. We’ve never had an issue. We’ve never been written up one time. So what is it really about?”
Joshua Smith, a spokesman for the California Coastal Commission, told Fox News Digital that permits are determined on a case-by-case basis, citing environmental concerns to “protect the bay.”
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Organizer John Morris said environmental studies are regularly conducted to measure the impact of the fireworks show on the bay. (Allen J. Schaben/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)
Smith said Morris was approved for a permit to hold a drone show in lieu of fireworks. Morris told Fox News Digital such a show would cost about $200,000 — roughly four times more than traditional fireworks.
Smith confirmed that SeaWorld received a permit allowing 40 nights of fireworks. When pressed on the discrepancy, he reiterated that decisions are made individually and declined to provide further details.
Morris said the loss of the fireworks show will be felt across the community, from local businesses to families who have made the event an annual tradition.
LOS ANGELES (AP) — In the wide-open race for California governor, billionaire Tom Steyer is on a spending binge.
The hedge fund manager-turned-liberal activist is using his personal fortune to saturate TV screens and mobile phones with advertising, while his competitors accuse him of trying to use his vast wealth to buy the state’s most powerful job.
Steyer’s ads — in which he promises to bring down household costs or rails against federal immigration raids — appear inescapable at times in heavily Democratic Los Angeles, the state’s largest media market. Data compiled by advertising tracker AdImpact show Steyer has spent or booked over $115 million in ads for broadcast TV, cable and radio — nearly 30 times the amount of his nearest Democratic rival.
If he makes it through the June 2 primary election, Steyer could easily eclipse the 2010 record set by Republican Meg Whitman, who spent $178.5 million in a losing bid for governor, much of it her own money. At the time, it was the costliest campaign for statewide office in the nation’s history.
Even when ad buys from all his major competitors are combined, along with ad purchases by independent committees supporting candidates, Steyer is outspending the field by tens of millions of dollars.
“Billionaire money is flooding our state in an attempt to buy this election,” former U.S. Rep. Katie Porter, one of Steyer’s chief rivals, warned her supporters this month.
Mail-in ballots are set to go out to voters next month. Steyer is among a crowd of candidates hoping to seize a spotlight after former Democratic U.S. Rep. Eric Swalwell’s dramatic departure from the race following sexual assault allegations that he denies.
But while Steyer has ticked up in polling amid his spending splurge, he has not broken away from the field, leaving some wondering if he’s getting value for his dollars.
“If your first round of ads doesn’t move you dramatically (in the polls), the third, fourth, fifth, six, seventh and eighth rounds won’t either,” said veteran Democratic strategist Bill Carrick, who for years advised the late Democratic U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein. “There is something inherently holding Steyer back.”
In recent prior campaigns for governor, at this stage a leading candidate was taking control of the race. This year, voters appear to be shrugging at a contest that lacks a star candidate among seven leading Democrats and two Republicans.
“Somehow the campaign is frozen,” Carrick added.
History shows that money doesn’t always translate into votes.
Billionaire developer Rick Caruso spent over $100 million in 2022 in his bid to become Los Angeles mayor, much of it his own money, but he was handily defeated by Mayor Karen Bass, who spent a fraction of Caruso’s total. Billionaire former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg spent more than $1 billion of his own money on his 2020 presidential bid before dropping out. And Steyer’s money was unable to lift him into contention in the 2020 presidential contest, when he dropped out early in the year after a poor finish in the South Carolina primary.
Steyer has never held elected office.
In a 2019 interview with The Associated Press, Steyer was asked what he would say to people who think he’s trying to buy the presidency.
“I don’t think that’s possible,” Steyer said at the time, before adding, “I’m never going to apologize for succeeding in business. That’s America, right?”
His campaign did not respond directly when asked about similar criticism facing his run for governor.
“Tom now stands as the only Democrat with the grassroots energy, institutional backing and resources to advance to the general election,” spokesperson Kevin Liao said in a statement.
The governor’s race was recently reordered by two developments: Swalwell, a leading Democrat, abruptly withdrew from the race then resigned from Congress, following sexual assault allegations. Meanwhile, President Donald Trump endorsed conservative commentator Steve Hilton.
Still, there is no clear leader.
Polling in late March and early April by the nonpartisan Public Policy Institute of California found a cluster of candidates in close competition: Democrats Steyer and Porter, Republicans Hilton and Chad Bianco, and Swalwell. Other candidates were trailing. The polling was conducted before Swalwell withdrew.
Democrats have feared the party’s large number of candidates could lead to them getting shut out of the general election in November. That’s because California has a primary system in which only the top two vote-getters advance to the general election, regardless of party.
Leading Democrats are all claiming to have picked up support since Swalwell’s exit. Steyer nabbed one plum endorsement, when the influential California Teachers Association, which previously backed Swalwell, recommended him.
In his ads, Steyer promises to “abolish” U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which has been staging raids across California. In another, he laments the state’s punishing cost of housing, “Everybody needs an affordable place to live,” he says.
Rapper was stabbed 16 times by fellow inmate in May 2025 while 10-year sentence in Megan Thee Stallion shooting case
Tory Lanez has filed a $100 million lawsuit against the California Department of Corrections stemming from a May 2025 incident where the rapper was stabbed in prison.
Lanez — born Daystar Peterson and currently serving a 10-year sentence after being found guilty in the Megan Thee Stallion shooting case — also sued the warden and guards at the California Correctional Institute in Tehachapi, where the rapper was stabbed 16 times in an “unprovoked life-threatening attack” by another inmate, the lawsuit states.
Peterson was hospitalized following the May 2025 incident, suffering a collapsed lung among stab wounds to his back, torso, and head.
According to the Associated Press, the lawsuit criticized the Department of Corrections for housing Peterson with fellow inmate and alleged attacker Santino Casio, who was serving a life sentence for second-degree murder. “The choice to house Casio with Peterson was known or should have been a known danger,” the lawsuit said, adding that Tory Lanez’ “high-profile celebrity status” made him a target.
The lawsuit also said that prison guards were slow to respond to the shanking, and didn’t employ flash grenades or other measures to halt Casio’s attack.; Casio was not charged for stabbing Peterson, the Associated Press notes.
Lanez, who following his hospitalization was transferred to San Luis Obispo County’s California Men’s Colony, also alleges in the lawsuit that he never received his possessions from the California Correctional Institute in Tehachapi, including songbooks filled with lyrics to his unreleased music.
Lanez is serving a 10-year prison sentence for shooting Megan Thee Stallion in the foot during a confrontation in the summer of 2020. He was eventually convicted on several firearms charges, including assault with a firearm, in December 2022. In November 2025, his appeal was denied by a three-judge panel, and the 10-year sentence was upheld.
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