Video: White House Laughs When Asked About Baby Formula Shortage

In case you haven’t noticed, and unless you have a newborn or infant under 12 months old, you may be unaware of the baby food shortage gripping the country right now. The issue has been festering for weeks, made worse by the shuttering of an Abbott Nutrition plant back in February which the FDA still has yet to re-open despite desperate pleas from parents nationwide.

When asked on Wednesday about the issue, the White House stated that the problem was being worked on and was a top priority for the Biden administration.

When pressed further, White House Spokeswoman Karine Jean-Pierre admitted, in a dismissive tone, that there was no point person working on the problem and then laughed her way out of the question:

Amid the outcry, Abbott Nutrition says that within two weeks, they could begin providing baby formula to store shelves again once the FDA approves:

“Subject to [U.S. Food and Drug Administration] approval, we could restart the site within two weeks,” the statement continues. “We would begin production of EleCare, Alimentum and metabolic formulas first and then begin production of Similac and other formulas. From the time we restart the site, it will take six to eight weeks before product is available on shelves.”

The company said Wednesday that “after a thorough review of all available data, there is no evidence to link our formulas to these infant illnesses.”

In the meantime, pressure has been building for the FDA to do more to address the infant formula shortage. FDA Commissioner Robert Califf said in a statement Tuesday that the agency was “doing everything in our power to ensure there is adequate product available where and when” consumers need it.

So, what’s the issue? The recall happened back in February, and Abbott’s manufacturing has been cleared, yet the FDA, run by the Biden administration, continues to drag its feet while parents and infants suffer.

Stunted by supply chain issues and waning domestic manufacturing, and a slow response from the Biden administration, the baby formula shortage has grown into a serious problem for parents of bottle-fed infants and newborns.

For the White House to still be this unprepared to answer, and for Jean-Pierre to laugh in the face of desperate parents once again speaks to how entirely out of touch this administration is with the realities of life for millions of Americans. Most assuredly, the issue is not a laughing matter for desperate parents visiting a dozen stores trying to find even one can of formula.

This of course ignores infants that need special formulas which were already sometimes hard to find during non-Biden years. Those situations are even more dire.

The issue of panic-buying is also likely making the issue worse. Now, when parents find a few containers on the shelf, they buy as many as they can afford due to the scarcity, once again contributing to the problem.

With Democrats so laser-focused on protesting abortion rights, maybe they should shift gears and work to figure out how they can keep babies alive that have already been born.

Luckily, with social media, parents have been able to engage and assist each other with baby formula recipes used back in the day before the advent of store-bought formula became the norm:

For Biden’s propensity to blame everyone else, it continues to be suspect that shortages, inflation, price hikes, and supply chain problems still plague the country over a year into his administration.


Nate Ashworth

The Founder and Editor-In-Chief of Election Central. He's been blogging elections and politics for over a decade. He started covering the 2008 Presidential Election which turned into a full-time political blog in 2012 and 2016 that continues today.

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