(FreedomBeacon.com)- Utah Republican Senator Mitt Romney on Tuesday criticized a $28 million bill passed through the House of Representatives that was aimed at helping to ease the shortage the country is experiencing on baby formula.
The bill, according to House leadership, would increase funding to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to help address the shortage. But, Romney was having none of that.
He told Business Insider:
“If it were actually buying infant formula, I might be inclined to support it. But, it’s paying more money for FDA people, which is not what we need. We need to get the formula, not more money for FDA inspectors.”
Last week, the House approved the bill that would give the FDA extra funding to do what they say would address the shortage of baby formula. All 219 Democrats supported the bill, but only 12 Republicans joined them.
That failure to attract a lot of Republican support — plus Romney’s critical comments — might spell doom for the bill in the Senate, where it would need the support of at least 10 Republicans.
Republicans would certainly be in favor of taking action to address the baby formula shortage, as they have lambasted the Biden administration for not doing more to prevent it from happening in the first place.
Earlier in May, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell released a statement that said:
“The baby formula shortages hurting American families are outrageous and unacceptable. This problem has been developing in slow motion for several months now, but the Biden administration has been characteristically sluggish and halting in response.”
The shortage was already starting to happen when a Michigan lab run by Abbott Nutrition was forced to shut down over concerns about an unsafe environment. Four infants were hospitalized after they came down with a rare bacterial illness.
Abbott is one of four companies that basically control almost all of the production of baby formula in the United States. The FDA hasn’t authorized the re-opening of the Abbott plant just yet. Even when it does, company officials said it would take many months for the products to eventually reach shelves where people can buy them.
The White House has attempted to solve the crisis, to little avail thus far. Some of the measures they’ve taken have attempted to reduce regulations and cut some red tape so that products could be moved onto shelves faster than normal.
It’s initiated a new program they’re calling Operation Fly Formula, which is hoping to import formula from other countries quickly. Last weekend, the first shipment from that program arrived from Germany to Indiana.
So far, though, that has done little to feed the infants that desperately need the formula. The House is trying to come up with a long-term solution, but Republicans such as Romney are viewing it in a different light — that it’s not actually solving the crisis at all.
Something needs to be done, and fast, so the Biden administration better get its act together fast.
