GOP jabs Biden over shortage of baby formula

AUSTIN, Texas — Republicans aiming to retake control of Congress have already sharpened a message centering around blaming Democrats for high inflation, expensive gas, migrants crossing the U.S.Mexico border and violent crime in some cities.

But GOP leaders landed on an issue this week that it hopes could prove even more potent: tying President Biden to a shortage in baby formula.

Parents are suddenly running into bare supermarket and pharmacy shelves in part because of ongoing supply disruptions and a recent safety recall. But in an election year that was already shaping up to be rocky for Democrats, Republicans sense that the shortage could prove to be an especially tangible way to argue that Biden is incapable of quickly solving problems confronting the U.S.

The administration has sometimes been slow in responding to sudden political threats, perhaps most notably when signs of inflation began to surface last year. The White House appears determined not to repeat that mistake, announcing on Friday that formula maker Abbott Laboratories committed to give rebates through August for a food stamp-like program that helps women, infants and children called WIC.

Biden insisted there’s “nothing more urgent we’re working on” than addressing the shortage.

But the defense by the White House illustrates how fingerpointing at the Biden administration has already spread far and wide among Republicans

Rebecca Heinrich, director of the Mothers’ Milk Bank, loads frozen milk donated by lactating mothers from plastic bags into bottles for distribution in Arvada, Colo.

in Washington, on television and on social media. It’s a new issue for the GOP to hammer at and a way to address families at a time when Democrats believe outrage over the U.S. Supreme Court possibly ending the right to an abortion could galvanize women and other key voters, and thwart or at least lessen a Republican wave in November.

The full-court press by Republicans included linking the

formula shortage with the rising number of migrants coming into the U.S. — one of the biggest issues they have sought to lay at the feet of an unpopular president.

Abbott Nutrition recalled several major brands of powdered formula and shut down the factory when federal officials began investigating four babies who suffered bacterial infections after consuming formula from the facility.

Abbott is one of only a handful of companies that produce the vast majority of the U.S. formula supply, so their recall wiped out a large segment of the market.

Democrats are framing the shortage as an example of how Americans are harmed when a few big companies control the market.

David Zalubowski / Associated Press