Officials at the Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR) resisted efforts to temporarily lift tariffs on baby formula imports during the 2022 shortage, documents obtained by ProPublica show.
In emails sent in May 2022, USTR officials pushed back against attempts to remove tariffs on baby formula, citing concerns that loosening tariffs would cause "lots of questions from domestic dairy producers." They even suggested that dairy industry giants should receive "a heads-up right before any press release goes out, so that they don't feel blindsided." By the end of that month, formula out-of-stock rates had reached 74 percent nationally, sending desperate parents scrambling for formula.
