As if the Biden administration needed one more thing to make it look bad, there’s a baby formula shortage that’s been brewing for months but has come to a head this spring. The shortage came about as the result of a confluence of factors: a recall at one of the largest formula plants in the country along with the supply chain and labor crises that have gripped virtually all sectors of this economy.
The administration faces criticism that it could have addressed the issue earlier, but the White House denies it. White House communications director Kate Bedingfield even refuses to refer to the shortage as a crisis.
“I’m not going to stand here and tell your audience that I can give you a hard timeline that I can’t give you,” Bedingfield told a CNN reporter. “We are being candid about moving as quickly as possible. And we are relentlessly focused on this.”
Adding insult to injury is the revelation that the administration has sent pallets loaded with formula to the border with Mexico in order to distribute it to illegal immigrant families with babies. Those pallets of formula may have been allocated for the border and couldn’t go anywhere else, but the scenario is, as they say, bad optics.
The baby formula shortage is yet another factor that could point to a drubbing in the midterms for the Biden administration. Here’s the lay of the land on polling. According to RealClearPolitics, the president is 11.9 points underwater on average approval numbers, with 53.3% disapproving of his performance and 41.4% approving. Republicans have an average 3.9% advantage on the generic congressional ballot, and, perhaps most tellingly, an average of 67.3% of those surveyed in polls say the country is headed in the wrong direction.
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But what the baby formula crisis — or whatever the White House wants to call it — could do damage to Biden’s numbers with a particular constituency: suburban women, particularly moms.
The Washington Times reminds us that “A Marist poll taken in late April showed suburban women favored Republicans over Democrats on the economy and slowing inflation, two top voter concerns. Among parents with children under 18, registered voters said they would pick a Republican over a Democrat in November’s congressional election by a nearly 30-point margin, 60% to 32%.”
The baby formula shortage could make an already bad situation for the administration even bleaker.
“Inflation and supply chain problems have badly damaged Biden’s public standing and Democratic midterm prospects,” pollster and analyst Ron Faucheux told the Times. “This is particularly true among independents and suburban women, and could get worse if the problems get worse.”
The left is banking on the forthcoming Supreme Court decision on Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization to drive the key demographic of suburban women to the Democrats on the abortion issue. But over the next six months, women will probably worry more about feeding babies than they will about killing them.
The administration claims that it’s doing all it can to ease the crisis, including easing some regulations and potentially invoking the Defense Production Act. Abbot Labs, the company that owns the plant that shut down due to recalls, is ramping up production quickly at the plant and is even quickly importing formula from Ireland.
But is it too late to save the Democrats’ hide with suburban women voters?
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