01-23-25 Interview - Rep. Ryan Gonzalez on How He's Making Eggs Cheaper For Coloradans

Yeah, it's like an area now perfect, excellent, there we go.

That was a lot.

But I'm in Puerto Rico and Representative Ryan Gonzalez is in Denver because the legislature's in session and he is trying to do something to restore our most affordable source of protein in the grocery store, and that is eggs. First of all, Representative Gonzales, welcome to the show.

Thank you so much for having me.

Maddy.

It's good to be here with you and happy to talk about what we're working on here for the people at calro.

So. Tell me about this.

Obviously, we've had significant egg shortages. There was like a month where I would go to the grocery store a couple times a week and there would literally be nothing on the grocery store shelves. I know we have bird flu, but it seems like it's way worse here. In my informal polling across Facebook, where I have friends all over the country, none of them are seeing the prices that we saw here. None of them are seeing the ongoing

Help?

Yeah, So thank you for your question.

And this basically is due in part because of a twenty twenty law that they passed, HB twenty thirteen forty three, which was sponsored by former Senator Carrie Donovan, mandating cage free eggs.

Now, this law has been phased in. It took full effect the beginning of.

This year, and so basically what we're seeing is an increase in prices of eggs that is also exacerbating the supply chain where we're not having enough of the eggs that we need, which also add a contribute to the high prices of eggs. And it also limits basically that we can't have eggs that are not cage free coming to Colorado. So when you have excess demand, like you just said, people.

Rely on those source of protein eggs.

Big thing families, especially lo income families who are hurting are feeling the pinch at the grocery store because of some of this policy that has been implemented.

So my bill would do away with them.

So we basically get back to more of a free market perspective, and there's consumer choice.

And see I'm glad you said free market because I buy I buy pasture raise eggs like I can fit that in my budget and eggs make up such a huge portion of my diet that I buy the stupid, expensive, fancy pasture raised eggs.

But that's my choice. I go to the.

Grocery store and I'm sure you've had this. You look like a young guy. I don't know if you have a family, but you go to the grocery store now and you get two little dinky bags and it's one hundred bucks.

I always think of like, how are young families dealing with that kind of stuff?

So this is the first in a step. You know, you're in committee, right, So what committee is going to hear this?

So it got assigned to the Agriculture Committee, and the hearing furthest bill will be Monday at one thirty.

Now, what kind of response have you gotten, either from your colleagues or from.

Across the aisle. Are you hopeful that.

This is going to pass or is it going to be dead in the water because it's got to have Democrats.

Yeah, so I'm hopeful that we can get at least some Democrats support some of the people who sit on the Agriculture Committee. Some of them who are Democrats live in competitive districts, so I think they're more inclined to listen to reason as far as hearing the concerns of people of Colorado, especially low income people who are hurting from the policy. Again going back to the consumer choice of if they want k tree or not, he used to let the because of the consumers decide.

And you know, we want to make it all about affordability, right.

You know, Jared Poulus in the state of the state has said he wants to make Colorado more affordable, and this is the way that we can do so by leviating some of the cost burdens that we have imposed in Colorado's because they need relief, whether it's fees, whether it's you know, for driving down.

The prices of goods like eggs.

This is something that all Colorados have cared about, and so I have heard. I've gotten a lot of support from my Republican caucus as well as the Republican senators.

There are some.

Democrats who have reached out to me who will have expressed interest in listening to the arguments for it.

Obviously they're not committing to one way or the other, but I can.

Tell you I have spoken to some stakeholders, one of them being the egg producers now, the egg producers have pushed back basically by saying that it's the bird flu the burchlues what's contributed to the high prices of eggs, and that the markets were basically training in that direction anyway, towards K free. But do that if the market was training towards K free, why do you need a lot

If you look at those states that have K three.

Versus non policies implemented, you will see that these states have lower prices of eggs in the states that do not have K tree loss. The usda A also came out with the report last month, saying that while the bird flu did a tribute in increasing prices of eggs, the cage free laws disproportionately impacted states who had such laws that were a factor in driving the prices up.

For that as well well.

I mean it prevents us from being able to go to a different egg producer in a different state that didn't have a bird flu outbreak. I mean, these outbreaks are happening all over the country, but we've limited the number of people that we can even try and buy eggs from.

So this is one of those.

Things that and don't get me wrong, I know it's well intentioned.

I'm probably one of the few talk show hosts.

In this country that have actually been to an egg farm, so I know exactly what goes on there.

And it's gross. I mean, it's.

Chickens are just, you know, kind of gross. So I understand this, But are the animal rights activists who've got this going in the first place. Have they indicated that they are going to resist the change?

So I have heard the ASPCA is remaining neutral. Now I have heard the Humane Society did in fact hire a.

Lobbyist to lobby against this bill.

But it's not about animal welfare, Mandy, It's about chicken welfare. You know, we're prioritizing chicken welfare over the welfare of our own citizens and residents of Colorado, people who are low income children, you know, our restaurant owners, schools, anything that's made with eggs.

We're prioritizing the welfare of chickens over.

That of our own people, and that has negative implementations, And like what you just said, I understand the humanitarian part of it, but we shouldn't be prioritizing chicken welfare over the needs of our people, many of who are struggling to get by.

Is this part of a group of bills that Republicans are trying to get through to take away some of the taxes and the fees that have been levied on us over the.

Years that are just like they're death by a thousand cuts because none of them are that big.

When you just say, oh, we're going to make you pay a little bit more for eggs, or oh, we're going to make you pay a bag fee when you get a bag.

Is this part of that group of bills that Republicans are bringing forward. Yeah.

Absolutely.

So you know, I won't speak for my entire caucus, but what I can say is we are very focused on making sure that we prioritize affordability, we protect tabor, we make sure we try to repeal some of these fees. We know, when you're minority, we understand that there's only so much we can pass. But with the policies we're proposing with some of these bills, I feel our sensible, realistic, practical, achievable.

They don't care about the prices of eggs because they can afford it.

It's the people who are struggling to get by the middle class, the low income people who are choosing between filling up their gas tanks or putting food on the table. And they feel that the eggs, of all things, is just something that shouldn't be a discussion for.

You know, providing relief for it. It's something that we should add on.

And we know what we're proposing should get some Democrat support to get it passed. We're not asking for much. We're asking to provide immediate relief.

For some of our well all of our residents across Colorado.

When it comes to energy and it comes to food, and it comes to housing, and it comes to fees.

This is stuff that the people want. You know, Rome wasn't.

Built in a day, and if we start getting rid of some of these fees and regulations like that cage free thing, it could definitely get us more towards a free market approach and.

Provide overall affordability. Slowly but surely we can get there.

Have you heard that egg producers in Colorado who've already gone cage free, You're like, look, we're not going back because it did cost too much to go back to what we were doing before.

Yeah.

No, And that's an argument that they have.

This isn't mandating that they go back to how they were before that. If they want to stay to K three's, that's their discretion, that's their choice.

I'm all about free markets.

If they want to make the decision to be K three or not, we should leave it up to the producers. We shouldn't have government mandated for everybody, especially the smaller, you know scale egg producers who can afford to basically have these implementations overnight. The regulations, the costs, the resources, the time, the effort. You've seen some of these places shut down because.

Of this law because they can't comply with it.

They don't have the money, they don't have the resources, and that basically just puts those people out of business.

And we should be thinking about the little guy, you know.

And that also adds to the constraint and supply that we have, and that's why we have a shortage of eggs in part because they can't comply with this policy.

Representative Ryan Gonzalez, I really appreciate your time today, and you're trying to make it more affordable for people who are struggling.

To pay for their groceries. We'll follow this bill and have you back on hopefully it'll be successful.

I know you do have an uphill battle, simply, the numbers are so not in your favor in terms of the political divide legislature. But I'm going to follow up and we'll touch back and see what happens at the end of all this. I appreciate your time today.

Well, hey, I appreciate you. Thank you so much for reaching out and happy to help you and happy to talk about my bills and what we can do to make Colorado affordable.

So absolutely all right.

That's Representative Ryan Gazalez. Thank you. So much,