Donald Trump took aim at a “ridiculous situation” that directly affects his daily life: paper straws.

He signed an executive order that rolls back a Biden administration policy to phase out federal purchases of single-use plastics, including straws, from food service operations, events and packaging by 2027, and from all federal operations by 2035.

“It’s a ridiculous situation. We’re going back to plastic straws,” Trump told reporters at the White House as he signed the order. “These things don’t work,” he said, referring to paper straws. “I’ve had them many times, and on occasion, they break, they explode.”

But Trump, such a fan of drinking Diet Coke that he has installed a button in the Oval Office in order to summon staff to deliver the drink, has long railed against any restrictions upon plastic straws. When attempting to gain re-election in 2020, his campaign soldreusable straws on its website claiming that “liberal paper straws don’t work”.

While plastic straws have been blamed for polluting oceans and harming marine life, Trump said on Monday that he thinks “it’s OK” to continue using them. “I don’t think that plastic is going to affect the shark very much as they’re … munching their way through the ocean,” he said at a White House announcement.

UN Environment Program statistics show that 460 million metric tonnes of plastic are produced every year, contributing to waste in the ocean and microplastics which can affect human health.

Some studies have shown that paper straws, however, contain significant amounts of “forever chemicals” such as polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS.

PFAS can stay in the environment for decades, contaminate water supplies and cause a variety of health issues.