Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) — an anti-Trump Democrat — was seemingly unable to remember what the price of eggs was in her home state, despite continually bringing attention to the high cost of eggs.
The New York Times interviewed Klobuchar about her insistence on bringing up the price of eggs, using it — seemingly — to suggest that President Trump has failed, despite his being in office just over one month after four years of rising prices and rampant inflation under the Biden administration.
The Times asked her about this messaging seemingly centering primarily on eggs and asked her a very simple question: “What did you last pay for a dozen eggs in Minnesota?”
Klobuchar did not immediately answer the question. Instead, she said, “I’ll have to check at our local grocery store.”
“I just got some last week, so I don’t want to give you the wrong figure,” she claimed. “But I know that they have definitely gone up.”
The Times then noted that Klobuchar interjected later in the conversation, suddenly offering the exact price of eggs in her state in the interview.
“There is a reason I waited on this, because there is a difference. In Minnesota, it’s around $8.50, which is — in my memory, it’s two to three times what it was last summer or last year,” she said.
“And then in the Giant Food [in Washington], it’s nine bucks. I go to three different grocery stores, but I always shop on my own,” she added.
It remains unclear why Klobuchar — now suddenly hyper focused on the issue of egg prices — could not immediately offer the price of eggs in her home state when asked.
The Times also pointed out that egg prices are up because of the bird flu and asked the senator if she holds Trump responsible for that.
“I hold him responsible for promises that he made, and the eggs are not the only issue here,” Klobuchar vaguely replied.
“If it was just one problem, then that would not be the problem. The problem is housing, child care. I don’t think anyone thought he was going to turn it around in one day, but he’s made no moves to turn it around,” she claimed. “None. Zero. And so that is the much bigger picture, and eggs are emblematic of the bigger picture.”
Inflationary policies of the Biden administration contributed to rising prices over the last four years, and in recent months, the bird flu threw another wrench in prices.
U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Secretary Brooke Rollins told Breitbart News this month that the administration is doing everything it can to lower prices, including the cost of eggs.
“My very first briefing—I think I was voted on around noon yesterday, I was sworn in around three, took a couple pictures, and then I immediately went into a briefing on avian flu and egg prices with the team at USDA,” Rollins told Breitbart News.
“I think I had about eight people in my office at USDA about it. I’ve already talked to the president about it. I’ve talked to my counterparts in the White House over at NEC, Kevin Hassett, and we’re not ready to announce anything yet, but next week we’ll be talking about this much more specifically,” she said, adding, “I think it’s real important for your audience to understand these egg prices are at an almost 40-year high and that this has been an upward trajectory for a little while.”
“Now, under the four years of Trump, they came back down in ’17, ’18, ’19, and ’20. At least in recent history, those years we had some of the lowest prices on record,” she added.
This week, Rollins said the USDA is “rolling out a plan that addresses the avian flu directly”:
But I do think it’s really important for everyone to understand that this problem did not just happen overnight, and it will take us a little while to get our arms around it. Vaccinations will continue to be looked at and reviewed. Only a handful of countries around the world actually use vaccinations for their egg-laying hens, for their chickens.
She added that this will include importing eggs.
“We are beginning to import. I just met with Ag. Commissioner of Texas Sid Miller (R), he let me know that they are working to import some eggs from the country of Turkey. … So, there will be some slight import, I think, to immediately address the shortage,” she explained.
“But, eventually, we will get our arms around this. We will, hopefully, solve for the avian flu, we will get the cost of inputs down, we will lift regulations, and, ultimately, it is — again, it is not just one reason that eggs are so high, it’s a myriad of reasons that we are working to solve every day,” Rollins added.