Trump's DOJ blames egg prices on California in new lawsuit

San Francisco Chronicle​

3 days ago

President Donald Trump's administration sued California over egg prices on Wednesday, claiming the state's voter-approved law protecting hens and pigs from being kept in small cages has driven costs skyward and violates U.S. farming laws and regulations. The suit did not mention that the California law, Proposition 12, has been upheld by the Supreme Court.
'California has contributed to the historic rise in egg prices by imposing unnecessary red tape on the production of eggs,' lawyers for Trump's Justice Department said in the lawsuit, filed in federal court in Los Angeles. Under federal law since 1970, they contended, no state can impose its own standards on the 'quality, condition, weight, quantity or grade' of eggs or their production that differ from nationwide standards.
Prop 12, approved by more than 62% of California's voters in 2018, requires producers of breeding pigs to house them in cages that give them room to turn around, and requires cage-free settings for egg-laying hens. It does not directly regulate out-of-state farmers but banned the sale in California of meats produced from animals in other states that violate the California standards.
It was challenged in court by the National Pork Producers Council and allied groups, who argued that Prop 12 would place unconstitutional burdens on interstate commerce while driving up prices nationwide.
But the Supreme Court, in a 5-4 ruling in May 2023, said the state had authority to protect California from practices it considers inhumane.
'In a functioning democracy, policy choices like these usually belong to the people and their elected representatives,' Justice Neil Gorsuch, a Trump appointee, wrote in the lead opinion. He said many state laws have economic effects in other states, but they violate the Constitution only if they were intended to interfere with commerce in those states.
Prop 12 was put on hold during the court case and did not take effect until January 2024. The National Pork Producers Council and other agricultural groups have continued to campaign against it, seeking federal legislation that would preempt the California law.
Trump, meanwhile, has blamed former President Joe Biden for the increase in egg prices during the last two years of Biden's administration. Biden 'let the prices of eggs get out of control,' Trump told Congress in March, and 'we're working hard to get it down.'
Economists, however, have blamed soaring egg prices on an outbreak of bird flu that began in 2022. The prices continued to rise in the first months of Trump's current administration before declining to near their former levels as conditions improved.
Wednesday's lawsuit by the Trump administration contended Prop 12 was legally defective without any reference to the previous case or the Supreme Court ruling. The 'cage standards' set by the California ballot measure 'do not advance consumer welfare' and must give way to federal regulation, the Justice Department's lawyers said.
They also blamed an earlier California ballot measure, Prop 2 of 2008, which prohibited farmers in the state from keeping egg-laying hens and other animals in confines that 'prevent them from 'laying down, standing up, and fully extending his or her limbs, and turning around freely.'
Federal law sets standards to ensure that 'eggs and egg products are wholesome and properly labeled and packaged to protect the health and welfare of consumers,' the administration's lawyers said, and states cannot impose stricter standards.