Was Glyphosate Found in Girl Scout Cookies?
The Not So Clean Girl Scout Cookies
Yes, glyphosate was found in Girl Scout Cookies according to a 2025 independent laboratory study commissioned by consumer advocacy groups Moms Across America and GMOScience. The study tested 25 samples of various cookie varieties purchased in California, Iowa, and Louisiana in late 2024, and all samples tested positive for glyphosate (the active ingredient in herbicides like Roundup) at detectable levels
Oh No! Not Thin Mints!
Thin Mints showed the highest at 111.07 parts per billion (ppb). It also detected toxic heavy metals like lead (in 96% of samples) and cadmium in most, with some exceeding U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) limits for drinking water, though these are not the direct standards for food.
Where is the contamination coming from?
Even though none of the wheat grown in America is Genetically Modified (GMO), glyphosate and other pesticides and herbicides are widely associated with US wheat farming. Highly processed foods also contain seed oils (erroneously called "vegetable oils") that are grown in similar conditions to wheat. Are the toxins deposited during the farming process, or are they residuals in the soil? It's hard to say.
This is why General Mills came looking for Gabe Brown
Regenerative Farming and Ranching takes nitrogen out of the air and harvests nutrients from the soil. There is little need for pesticides because the bio-diversity neutralizes insects and damaging plant diseases. For every damaging insect species, there are 1,700 beneficial insect species. Monoculture industrial farming creates a giant target for predator insects that necessitates pesticides because all the natural defenses have been wiped out. Regenerative farmers often leave living cover crops and plant through them with a seed drill. The living plants foster a diversity of insect life. Land without poisons will have birds and other insect predators aplenty.
Not To Worry!
The producers of Girl Scout Cookies assured us that that trace glyphosate and heavy metals occur naturally in soil and are common in many plant-based foods, including organics, but emphasized that levels do not pose health risks—e.g., a child would need to consume thousands of cookies daily to approach unsafe thresholds. Whew! That's good to know. Eating small amounts of toxins is OKAY!