White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt: Incentivized ‘Mass Killing’ of Over 100M Chickens Caused Steep Egg Prices

Savvy White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt addressed Tuesday in her first press briefing the reason why egg prices are so damn high.

“Egg prices have skyrocketed since President Trump took office, so what specifically is he doing to lower those costs for Americans?” asked a reporter who apparently had not noticed the skyrocketing egg prices the week prior when Joe Biden was still president.

“I’m really glad you brought this up, because there is a lot of reporting out there that is putting the onus on this White House for the increased cost of eggs,” Leavitt began and continued:

I would like to point out to each and every one of you that in 2024 when Joe Biden was in the Oval Office or upstairs in the residence sleeping, I'm not so sure, egg prices increased 65% in this country. We also have seen the cost of everything, not just eggs; bacon, groceries, gasoline, have increased because of the inflationary policies of the last administration. As far as the egg shortage, what's also contributing to that is that the Biden administration and the Department of Agriculture directed the mass killing of more than 100 million chickens, which has led to a lack of chicken supply in this country – therefore, lack of egg supply, which is leading to the shortage. So, I will leave you with this point: this is an example of why it's so incredibly important that the Senate moves swiftly to confirm all of President Trump's nominees, including his nominee for the United States Department of Agriculture, Brooke Rollins, who is already speaking with Kevin Hassett – who is leading the economic team here at the White House – on how we can address the egg shortage in this country.

What many Americans aren’t aware of is that the U.S. Department of Agriculture has funneled more than a billion in taxpayer funds to bail out large poultry producers who cull (kill) their chickens to stave off bird flu.

“If your flock is infected with highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI), the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) will provide indemnity and compensation for some of your losses and costs,” a USDA Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) notice explains to poultry producers.

Animal welfare organization Our Honor compiled a spreadsheet that includes payments made by USDA through the Livestock Indemnity Payment program in 2023. The full spreadsheet can be viewed here.

From ourhonor.org

Our Honor points out many large food corporations end the lives of even healthy chickens in cruel ways, including ventilation shutdown:

The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Livestock Indemnity Payment program granted more than $107.9 million dollars to Jennie-O Turkey Store alone, while their parent company, Hormel Foods, recorded net sales surpassing $12.1 billion in 2023, with an operating income of more than $1 billion. Tyson Foods was given more than $29 million dollars while bringing in more than $13 billion dollars in sales in 2023 and compensating CEO Donny King with more than $13 million dollars in 2023. Overall, the top 10 companies took more than 41% of the total indemnity payments.

“The breakdown of compensation has not been publicly released, but agency officials confirmed the accuracy of the figures,” noted poultry industry media PoultryProducer about the spreadsheet compiled by Our Honor.

The publication added that the government bailouts “highlight a deeply flawed system of corporate subsidies, which last year included more than $30 billion in taxpayer money directed to the agriculture sector, much of it for crop insurance, commodity price support and disaster aid.”

PoultryProducer noted:

But they say the payments related to bird flu are troubling for another reason: By compensating commercial farmers for their losses with no strings attached, the federal government is encouraging poultry growers to continue the very practices that heighten the risk of contagion, increasing the need for future cullings and compensation.

“These payments are crazy-making and dangerous,” Andrew deCoriolis, executive director of advocacy group Farm Forward, said, according to Poultry Producer. “Not only are we wasting taxpayer money on profitable companies for a problem they created, but we’re not giving them any incentive to make changes.”

The McCullough Foundation produced a video sorting out fact from fearmongering regarding avian flu and highlighting “the unnecessary killing of livestock as a biosecurity measure for bird flu,” as Dr. Peter McCullough wrote Thursday at Courageous Discourse.

Watch the video here.

“Let’s hope government subsidies to farmers for this counterproductive program stops and both animals and humans are allowed to develop natural immunity from this mild strain of H5N1,” McCullough added.