Congressman Riley Introduces Bipartisan Bill Aimed at Reducing Egg Prices

Congressman Josh Riley (NY-19) says he has introduced The Lowering Egg Prices Act with Dusty Johnson (R-S.D.), Pat Harrigan (R-NC), and Kristen McDonald Rivet (D-MI). The bill’s main focus is to lower egg prices for consumers through cutting the “red tape” which forces farmers to discard hundreds of millions of eggs each year.

“Families across Upstate New York are struggling to make ends meet because the grocery bills are too high,” said Congressman Josh Riley (D-NY). “My Lowering Egg Prices Act is a common-sense, bipartisan bill to take unnecessary regulations off the books, put hundreds of millions of eggs on the market, and lower your grocery bill.”

Rep. Riley’s office says current federal regulations have farmers be required to refrigerate eggs immediately after they are laid. Riley says this does not distinguish between table eggs and breaker eggs.

A table egg is raw products that do need refrigeration whereas breaker eggs are pasteurized for everyday grocery store products such as salad dressings, cake mixes, and pasta. The bill will overturn the regulation and then be able to put hundreds of millions of eggs back on the market.

“The FDA’s rule is a textbook example of government overreach making life more expensive for hardworking Americans,” said Congressman Pat Harrigan (R-NC). “For 15 years, this unnecessary regulation has forced businesses to throw away 400 million perfectly good eggs every single year. That’s over 6 billion eggs wasted—eggs that should have gone to breakfast tables, school lunches, and food banks. There is no public health benefit here, just pure bureaucratic nonsense that’s driving up costs. This bill stops the waste, lowers prices, and restores common sense.”