Interior, Environment, Financial Services, and General Government Appropriations Act, 2019

Floor Speech

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Ms. BALDWIN. Mr. President, I rise to urge my colleagues to oppose my colleague Senator Lee's amendment, which would interfere with the Food and Drug Administration's ability to enforce their regulations related to the names of dairy products. This amendment, if passed, would upend the FDA's review of nutrition innovation as part of its nutrition innovation strategy. It would short-circuit the agency's efforts to review standards of identity and other tools to provide meaningful, accurate information about food products to consumers, and it would block the agency from addressing the mislabeling of imitation products that use dairy names without meeting the legal requirements to use those terms.

The FDA currently has an open docket and the public is able to comment on these issues. We should all let that process play out.

But this isn't just an attack on the FDA's process. It is an attack on dairy farmers across the country and in my home State of Wisconsin. This attack couldn't happen at a worse time. Dairy farmers are facing extremely difficult times. In Wisconsin, last year we lost over 500 dairy farms, mostly small and medium family-size farms--almost 6 percent of the dairy farms operating in our State.

Dairy farmers in Wisconsin work hard to meet the various requirements for the milk they produce. This ensures that when a consumer buys a dairy product, it will perform in recipes as expected, and it will contain high-quality nutrients for those consumers.

I want to finish with one key point. There are already existing regulations on the books that define what constitutes dairy. However, the FDA has failed to enforce their own rules as imitation products have used dairy's good name for their own benefit.

I introduced the Dairy Pride Act to force the FDA to stop sitting on the sidelines and to enforce its own rules. Instead of blocking the FDA from doing its job as the Lee amendment would do, we should ensure that the FDA moves forward and enforces its own rules. Dairy farmers in Wisconsin shouldn't be asked to wait any longer.

I urge my colleagues to oppose the Lee amendment.

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Ms. BALDWIN. Madam President, I rise to urge my colleagues to support my bipartisan amendment with my colleague Senator Susan Collins. It would spur innovation in the dairy business.

This amendment would do three simple things. It would foster the development of innovative dairy products that respond to consumer demand, support new and existing dairy entrepreneurs to develop their businesses and expand their markets, and provide technical assistance to dairy processors to update their manufacturing processes and meet consumer demand.

Dairy farmers are facing extremely difficult times. These farmers are facing retaliatory tariffs, uncertainty about trade deals and export markets, and low milk prices. This amendment would provide technical assistance and solutions for dairy entrepreneurs so that farmers, dairy co-ops, and other businesses can find new ways to compete, increase their efficiency, and find more homes for the surplus of milk that we have.

I urge my colleagues to support this amendment.

I yield back.

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