Migrant advocates react angrily to Abbott’s assertion
McALLEN, Texas (Border Report) — Texas Gov. Greg Abbott on Thursday criticized the Biden administration for offering child formula to migrant kids in holding amenities amid a nationwide shortage.
The feedback got here as President Joe Biden spoke with CEOs from child formula corporations on Thursday to hasten to get extra child formula provides on cabinets nationwide and restrict restrictions, senior administration officers mentioned.
In a joint assertion by Abbott and Border Patrol Council President Brandon Judd on Thursday mentioned: “Children are our most vulnerable, precious Texans and deserve to be put first. Yet, President Biden has turned a blind eye to parents across America who are facing the nightmare of a nationwide baby formula shortage. 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. This is yet another one in a long line of reckless, out-of-touch priorities from the Biden Administration when it comes to securing our border and protecting Americans. Our children deserve a president who puts their needs and survival first – not one who gives critical supplies to illegal immigrants before the very people he took an oath to serve.”
While moms and dads stare at empty grocery retailer cabinets in panic, the Biden Administration is joyful to offer child formula to unlawful immigrants coming throughout our southern border.”
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott and Border Patrol Council President Brandon Judd
Abbott has been outspoken in opposition to permitting migrants to cross from Mexico into Texas and has even spent billions of state funds and sources as a part of Operation Lone Star to “secure the border,” which he has repeatedly mentioned the Biden administration has “failed to do.”
Migrant advocates reacted angrily Thursday to Abbott’s assertion.
“Children need nutrition,” Joshua Rubin, of the group Witness At the Border, informed Border Report. “You make a 1,500-mile journey with babes in arms. They’re going to need to be fed and any decent human being looks for a way to feed them, not for a way to deprive them.”
“Gov. Abbott has a political agenda that’s willing to punish children instead of here, in the richest nation on earth, figuring out a way to make sure all of God’s children have enough formula,” Rubin mentioned.
“It’s so unfortunate that our governor is so short-sighted in his thinking. And is instead interested in stoking, xenophobia, racism and fear in an environment where we can be acting out of abundance, versus a scarcity mentality,” mentioned Marisa Limón Garza, senior director for advocacy and programming for Hope Border Institute in El Paso, Texas.
“These children, all children, deserve access to a full life including food, shelter and love. If we collaborated and thought creatively about expanding our resources verses focusing on political theatre, we just might be able to feed every child regardless of status,” Garza informed Border Report.
“It’s unbelievable. This is precisely when you believe you already touched bottom in terms of anti-immigrant and anti-humanity statements and policies fermented by the governor, then you see this. How he’s using children — babies — as part of his distorted political platform,” Fernando Garcia, founder and govt of the Border Network for Human Rights, a border rights coalition primarily based in El Paso.
“He’s not only demonizing immigrants in Texas by calling them criminals and rapists but now to this extent that he is using immigrant children and babies as part of his political gain. That is shameful,” mentioned Garcia, whose group was in McAllen on Thursday after a two-week tour of the Texas border that began in El Paso, to name for higher migrant rights.
In a name with media on Thursday afternoon, White House senior administration officers defined the child formula shortage started on Feb. 17 when the nation’s largest toddler formula producer within the nation, Abbott Nutrition, initiated a voluntary recall of a number of traces of formula after issues of doable bacterial contamination at its manufacturing facility in Sturgis, Michigan.
Four infants turned sick and two died in late 2021 and early 2022 previous to the voluntary recall.
On Thursday, “President Joe Biden spoke with retailers and manufacturers, including the CEOs of Walmart, Target, Mead Johnson and Gerber to talk to them about the work they are doing and call on them to do all they can to help families purchase and access infant formula,” a senior administration official mentioned.
They mentioned quicker inventory cabinets and different corporations taking on the slack of stock in Abbott Nutrition’s absence.
They additionally mentioned “additional steps to get more infant formula onto store shelves as quickly as possible without compromising safety,” a senior administration official mentioned.
This contains the next:
- Increasing imports of child formula.
- Calling on the FTC and state attorneys normal “to crack down on price gouging and unfair market practices related to the sales of infant formula,” officers mentioned.
- Cutting crimson tape and restrictions to get extra toddler formula to retailer cabinets by urging states to offer flexibility within the WIC program.
WIC applications usually authorize the acquisition of 12-ounce formula containers, however the administration desires to chop out that requirement to permit WIC households to purchase 32-ounce containers and that will permit producers to supply extra product in bigger batches faster, senior administration officers mentioned.
“This administration is working around the clock to do everything we can to bring as much production to market while protecting the safety and wellbeing of families,” a senior administration official mentioned.