Post Politics Now Biden administration acts to address baby formula shortage as parents scramble

While the White House (and parents) struggled with a national shortage of baby formula, Republicans spent Thursday sparking a faux outrage over claims that Biden is stockpiling the product for undocumented immigrants.

“They are sending pallets, pallets of baby formula to the border. Meanwhile, in our own district at home, we cannot find baby formula,” Rep. Kat Cammack (R-Fla.), claimed on social media.

That sentiment spread like wildfire among conservatives.

“While mothers and fathers stare at empty grocery store shelves in a panic, the Biden administration is happy to provide baby formula to illegal immigrants coming across our southern border,” Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) said in a joint statement with National Border Patrol Council President Brandon Judd.

But, as The Post’s Fact Checker Glenn Kessler points out, the Biden administration is just following the law. At issue is the Flores consent decree, which requires that the federal government protect children in immigration officials’ custody, regardless of whether they were apprehended crossing the border alone or with family. Per the decree:

“Whenever the INS takes a minor into custody, it shall expeditiously process the minor and shall provide the minor with a notice of rights, including the right to a bond redetermination hearing if applicable. Following arrest, the INS shall hold minors in facilities that are safe and sanitary and that are consistent with the INS’s concern for the particular vulnerability of minors. Facilities will provide access to toilets and sinks, drinking water and food as appropriate, medical assistance if the minor is in need of emergency services, adequate temperature control and ventilation, adequate supervision to protect minors from others, and contact with family members who were arrested with the minor.”

Among the standards dictated by the rule: “Food must be appropriate for at-risk detainees’ age and capabilities (such as formula and baby food).”

While Trump did try to get rid of the Flores decree, he was blocked by courts, so he, too, was forced to comply.

Read more on this faux outrage here.

An estimated “thousands or tens of thousands” Native American, Native Alaskan and Native Hawaiian children died in the custody of federal Indian boarding schools, casualties of an assimilation policy that separated children from their families to strip them of their language and culture, the Interior Department said.

As Moriah Balingit reports:

The revelation was part of a report that attempts to catalogue the scale of the system and the abuses that occurred inside schools intended to reeducate the children. Officials identified 53 schools that had marked or unmarked burial sites containing the remains of children who died at schools often far from home. The agency documented 500 deaths in 19 of the schools, the report said. But the investigation is far from over, as officials said they expected the number of deaths to rise to “thousands or tens of thousands,” and to find many more burial sites.

The children died in the custody of residential schools owned or supported by the federal government that operated between 1819 and 1969 as part of a horrific campaign to erase their Native roots and exploit their labor, all under the guise of educating them, according to the report. It was a deliberate effort, articulated in federal policy, to assimilate and westernize Native communities to make it easier to take their land, the report said.

The report was commissioned last year by Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, the first Native American Cabinet secretary, after the First Nations of Canada, seeking to understand what happened to generations of its youth, discovered several burial sites connected to residential schools containing the remains of hundreds of children — some as young as 3 years old.

Haaland, in an opinion piece for The Washington Post, said her own grandparents were taken to residential schools. Some of the schools were run by the agency that she now leads.

The report marks a turning point for the department.

It details, among other terrible findings, how the U.S. government, through laws and policies, separated children from their families as a way to weaken communities and make it easier for the government to take their lands. These children were sent to schools where they were sometimes crowded three to a bed in deteriorating facilities, where they were forced to do manual labor.

“Rampant physical, sexual, and emotional abuse; disease; malnourishment; overcrowding; and lack of health care in Indian boarding schools are well-documented,” according to the report published this week.

The report also notes the lasting impacts of the schools on present-day Native Americans and their communities:

Studies of adults who attended the schools as children have found they suffer from much higher rates of physical health problems, a trend that is passed on to their children, who also are less healthy than the general population.

In its recommendations, the agency called for continued investigation into the federal Indian boarding school system, including identifying and interviewing surviving former students of the schools and providing them with mental health care. It also recommended facilitating the transfer of remains so that they can receive proper burials, and memorializing the children with a monument.

Read more on this report here.

Investigators have begun conducting interviews, and a federal grand jury issued a subpoena, as part of the Justice Department’s probe into how 15 boxes of government documents — some marked classified — made their way to former president Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence, people familiar with the matter told our colleagues Matt Zapotosky, Jacqueline Alemany and Josh Dawsey.

Per Matt, Jacqueline and Josh:

One person familiar with the matter, who like the others spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss an ongoing investigation, said investigators had quizzed some former Trump White House aides about the boxes and how they were prepared; another person said investigators were still making interview requests of those involved. …

Mishandling classified materials is a federal crime, though substantiating charges in such cases can be difficult. The FBI often investigates to determine who might have seen sensitive government information, and prevent it from spreading further.

These moves are signs the Justice Department investigation is moving forward, with potential legal or political consequences for Trump or others involved in the handling of the government materials.

But the subpoena to the National Archives and the interviews with people who might know about the handling of the materials are not by themselves an indication that anyone will be charged with a crime. To substantiate a criminal case, prosecutors would have to prove Trump or others intentionally mishandled the materials or were grossly negligent in doing so — a high legal bar.

But, as our colleagues explain, the probe will be another in a long list that could dog Trump as he signals he might run again for president in 2024.

Read more about these latest moves here.

Why is there a national shortage of infant formula? — we asked ourselves following reports of empty shelves and price gouging

The shortage can be traced to a product recall from the nation’s largest infant formula producer, Abbott Nutrition.

Abbott voluntarily shut down a U.S. factory in February that produces some of the most purchased varieties of baby formula, Similac and other brands. It did so following consumer reports that the formula was contaminated.

Four children — one in Minnesota, one in Texas and two in Ohio — fell ill with bacterial infections, and two died. Although Abbott said its own investigation found that the formula made at the Sturgis, Mich., facility is unlikely to be the source of the infections, it still paused production.

While pandemic-driven shutdowns have slowed the delivery of ingredients and packaging — as it has for so many products necessary for Americans’ day-to-day life — the shortage worsened after the factory shut down.

On Wednesday, the company said it could restart production in two weeks if cleared by the Food and Drug Administration, but that means it would still take about six to eight weeks for product to hit shelves.

The White House, meanwhile, said Thursday that the FDA is planning on announcing further steps to alleviate the shortage, but it didn’t specify when it would give Abbott clearance to reopen its Michigan facility.

The House special committee investigating the deadly Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the Capitol has subpoenaed five Republican House members, ordering that they testify about whether they aided and abetted the attack.

The committee had initially asked them to voluntarily testify about their knowledge of the attack. They all refused. So now, the panel has taken the rare step of forcing members to testify — subpoenas, by definition, are legally blinding requests.

But, as Amber Phillips writes, there are a few ways these Republicans can fight this. And while the options are limited, it could help them delay the process and run out the clock, which is what many in the GOP are hoping will happen.

If they hold off the investigation long enough — until, say, November, when Democrats could lose the House (thus, ending the investigation) — then maybe it could all go away.

The first option is going to court to fight the subpoena by arguing that the request is politically motivated. But as Stanley Brand, a congressional ethics expert who is representing former deputy White House chief of staff Dan Scavino before the committee, told Amber, doing so would be a “novel” and risky legal argument:

“No court has recognized partisanship as a reason in and of itself” to let someone sidestep a subpoena, he said.

Plus, just this month in a separate case, a federal judge recently sided with the Jan. 6 committee over Republicans, ruling that the committee does have a valid purpose and is legitimately constructed.

Option 2 is arguing that, under the Constitution, they are immune from being questioned about their work as lawmakers. That’s the “speech and debate clause.” But:

[This clause] specifically protects lawmakers from questioning in venues outside of Congress. The Jan. 6 committee was set up by Congress and made up of members of Congress.

Option 3 is arguing that the committee, in subpoenaing members of Congress, is creating a slippery-slope situation:

“What would stop a committee from subpoenaing members of the opposite party to obtain a political advantage?” asked Brand, summarizing a potential argument. “That is why the Ethics Committee is evenly split — to prevent abuse of the minority by the majority.”

Committee members argue that they’re focused on a very narrow, legislative purpose: Find out why the attack on the Capitol happened and what laws Congress can pass to prevent it from ever happening again.

Read more about the potential arguments here.

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) objected to a Senate vote on an aid package for Ukraine, meaning the chamber will not approve the measure this week.

Biden wanted the bill — which sends $39.8 billion in economic, humanitarian and defense aid to Ukraine — on his desk by the end of this week.

Paul single-handedly blocked the measure’s swift advancement because the Senate requires unanimous consent to quickly move such a bill to a final vote. Because of his opposition to a quick vote, the Senate must now go through all the usual procedural hoops.

“We cannot save Ukraine by dooming the U.S. economy,” Paul said of the vote.

Paul, who is ideologically opposed to sending more dollars overseas to a war in which the United States is not directly fighting, said the only way he’d vote to advance the bill was if he was allowed to include a provision that would require the appointment of an inspector general to oversee the funding. Doing so would have forced the bill to go back to the House.

Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), who had agreed to pass the aid package this week, offered Paul an amendment vote on his provision. He rejected it.

“He is simply saying, ‘My way or the highway,’ ” Schumer said, per Mike DeBonis. “When you have a proposal to amend a bill, you can’t just come to the floor and demand it by fiat. You have to convince other members to back it first. That is how the Senate works.”