Analysis: Trump's efforts to lower egg prices gets overshadowed by more partisan moves

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump and his team have had success in driving down egg prices, but achieving this campaign promise largely has been drowned out by their aggressive push to expand executive authority, target political rivals and dismantle certain government agencies.

Some congressional Democrats, sensing a politically weakened president and Republican Party, have been increasingly vocal about the administration’s economic and government-cutting policies. On the latter, Trump acknowledged Monday during a Cabinet meeting that he has “no idea how it plays out in the public.”

“We’ve done a lot of cutting. … But it’s something that has to be done,” the president said. “The country was riddled with fat.”

Trump on Monday highlighted his administration’s focus on bringing down egg prices.

“If you look at when I came in after one week, they were screaming at me about eggs,” he said. “Eggs had nothing to do with me, but they were through the roof, and you couldn’t get them down.”

Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins on Friday touted the administration’s agreements with Turkey and South Korea to ramp up their egg exports to the United States, adding that she was talking to other countries as well.

Those negotiations could lead to “hundreds of millions of eggs for the short term,” she told reporters outside the White House. Egg imports from Brazil also have increased since Trump returned to office, Reuters reported Monday.

Wholesale prices for white large shell eggs recently declined by 89 cents to $3.27 a dozen, according to the United States Department of Agriculture’s “Egg Markets Overview” report released Friday. Midwest states saw a significant decline in the price of white large shell eggs, down by $2.40 to $5.07 per dozen, according to the USDA.

“Demand for shell eggs halted its sharp downward slide as the rapid contraction in wholesale shell egg prices experienced over the past week caught the attention of many marketers looking to rebuild their depleted stocks,” according to the USDA report. “Consumers are slowly beginning to see downward price adjustments and increasing availability in the dairycase and just in time as the market is on the cusp of the Easter and Passover demand season.”

“It remains to be seen if the recent price drops will be sufficiently reflected in store shelves to encourage price-weary consumers to not limit their holiday celebrations,” the report stated. “Grocers are making some headway on the supply front and are saving their feature activity for the approaching Easter/Passover season.”

The White House has been eager to promote the falling egg prices as a big economic win. For instance, in a Friday email titled “Week Nine Wins,” the White House wrote: “President Trump’s economic agenda continued to deliver needed economic relief for Americans following years of Bidenflation. Wholesale egg prices dropped for the third straight week — down more than 50 percent since President Trump took office.”

Rollins, in a Friday interview with Fox Business, touted steps taken to curb the spread of the bird flu, including “repopulating the cold birds a lot more quickly” and “investing in biosecurity to lock the barns down.” And she touted administration efforts aimed at “deregulating” the agriculture industry so poultry producers “can be more efficient and more effective in their production for Americans.”

Yet, Trump’s other bold moves have overshadowed reports of that positive economic development, according to recent polls that show his approval rating sinking into net negative territory. Those include his tariffs push, his slamming of federal judges and moves against legal and political foes, as well as his push to overhaul certain federal agencies and fire many of their employees.

Monday brought another contentious personnel move: Trump named Alina Habba, a longtime personal attorney who had been a White House counselor, to serve as the interim U.S. attorney for New Jersey. The decision installs another loyalist to a high-profile judicial position as congressional Democrats and advocates for federal workers assert that some of his second-term actions have been illegal or test the bounds of legality.

“Alina will lead with the same diligence and conviction that has defined her career, and she will fight tirelessly to secure a Legal System that is both ‘Fair and Just’ for the wonderful people of New Jersey,” Trump wrote on social media.

Some Democratic lawmakers and strategists have pushed for their party to hit Trump and Republicans harder on kitchen table issues.

“Democrats are uniting behind an economic message, and that is clearly their best line of attack,” Brad Bannon, a Democratic strategist, said in a Monday email. “The president has been so preoccupied with fighting the culture wars and punishing his opponents that he waved the white flag in the battle against high prices.

(Trump’s) surrender will prove his undoing if Democrats stay together and press the point. ‘Benefits over billionaires,’” he added, surmising that recent Democratic messaging “is catching and is a great way to preview the congressional battle over Trump’s tax cuts for bankers and billionaires.”

‘Fights harder for us’

Some Democratic lawmakers have said the president has done next to nothing to deliver on his economic campaign promises.

“Trump and his cronies are so out of touch, they think ‘grocery shopping’ is just an errand they send their staffers to do for them at Whole Foods,” California Rep. Eric Swalwell wrote in a fundraising email. “Friend, from eggs to milk to cereal, everything is more expensive in Trump’s America — and it’s devastating working families.”

At a rally Friday at Denver’s Civic Center Park that some local media outlets estimated drew 30,000 people, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., called out Democrats and Republicans alike.

“We’re all here together because we share in the frustration and heartache that comes from watching those in power actively tear down or refuse to fight for working Americans like us,” she said during a stop on what’s been dubbed the “Fight Oligarchy” tour with Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt.

The duo’s message at several events during the congressional recess was focused on the kind of populist progressivism that was a hallmark of Sanders’ two unsuccessful campaigns for president.

“We will not allow America to become an oligarchy,” Sanders said in Denver. “This nation was built by working people, and we’re not going to let a handful of billionaires run the government.”

Ocasio-Cortez made clear she wants her own party to push back on Trump’s economic agenda.

“This isn’t just about Republicans,” she said to cheers, before alluding to Democratic senators, including Charles E. Schumer, who drew backlash from base voters over their support to advance the Republican-led government funding measure to stave off a shutdown: “We need a Democratic Party that fights harder for us, too.”

California Rep. Ro Khanna said at a recent town hall that members of his party should be more vocal.

“We are the party of FDR and John F. Kennedy and Barack Obama. And if the party is letting us down, it’s time to rebuild the party and understand what this party has achieved for America,” he said to applause.

But as Democrats search for a winning message to take on Trump, a spokesman for the House GOP campaign arm said the party was rudderless.

“There is no other way Democrats can spin it: They are in their darkest place in decades,” Mike Marinella, national press secretary for the National Republican Congressional Committee, said in a statement. “They have no leader, no message, and no strategy because the American people have had it with their out of touch policies.”

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