Dear Friend,

We are mid-way through our legislative week in Washington, but we have yet to take any votes on actual solutions to address the issues impacting Minnesotans and their families. Inflation continues to climb, gas prices have hit new highs, and the baby formula crisis continues to put infants, new mothers, and families in a terrifying position. Unfortunately, despite Speaker Pelosi and President Biden saying they have been working to resolve these issues for months, they remain more focused on offering up messaging legislation to score political points than listening to the needs of Americans. 

Our office is pressing the Administration to increase domestic production of all forms of energy, urging the Food and Drug Administration to approve the restart of formula production at key facilities in the United States, and has introduced legislation to balance our budget and get federal spending under control.

Read on to hear more about my work in Washington this week…

Nationwide formula shortages

For weeks, store shelves across America have had dwindling supplies of baby formula. This is a crisis for every parent, but especially those of the one-fifth of American infants who rely on formula alone.

In Minnesota, 40% of baby formula is out of stock, and some families report visiting a dozen stores a day in search of formula. Tragically, these shortages were preventable. American parents could foresee this crisis; why couldn’t President Biden?

Last week, over 100 of my Republican colleagues and I sent a letter to President Biden and Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Robert Califf asking about their plan to fix the shortage and whether the Administration has performed outreach to ensure pediatric hospitals have an adequate supply of formula. You can read more about my work to address this shortage here.

If you are a parent or caregiver in search of formula, you can find information from the Minnesota Department of Health about formula brand substitution here.

Recognizing National Police Week

Click above to watch a National Police Week message from Congressman Emmer.­­­­­­­

Meeting with Minnesota Leaders in Washington

During my time in Washington the past few weeks, it has been my pleasure to meet with some wonderful advocates from Minnesota.

Last week, I sat down with Ken Holmen, CEO of CentraCare. CentraCare operates dozens of hospitals and clinics across Central Minnesota and provides care to thousands of us here in the Sixth District.   

We had the chance to talk about CentraCare’s work to promote telehealth and their ongoing workforce and rural health challenges. We’re grateful for the work CentraCare does for the health of our community and look forward to working with Ken to support high-quality care.

On Tuesday, we had the opportunity to speak with Minnesota activists from the Alzheimer’s Association, including Sixth District constituent Kanada Yazbek.

Like 5.8 million Americans, Kanada suffers from Alzheimer’s. She and her fellow activists came to Capitol Hill this week to bring increased visibility and resources to fight Alzheimer’s. Together, we will bring an end to this vicious disease.

Upcoming town hall

This Friday, we are excited to be hosting another town hall, this time at Blaine City Hall at 7PM. You can find more information about the event on my website, here.

Until next week, if you are in need of assistance or would like to share your thoughts with me, please write me an e-mail here.

To keep up with what we’re doing in Washington, follow me on Twitter and Facebook for more updates!

Sincerely,