A recent letter to the Portland Press-Herald on California’s Proposition 12 (“Maine lawmakers should keep EATS Act out of Farm Bill,” Aug. 13) gets it wrong. Proposition 12 is a California law that dictates costly mandates to farmers in Maine and the other 48 states if they want to sell eggs and pork in California. These costs aren’t just felt by Californians. They’re felt by Mainers and consumers across the country as farmers have to raise their prices for everyone to cover the costs of this overreaching California regulation.

While the letter laughably claims Proposition 12 is a “popular, commonsense law” that “consumers have clearly asked for,” nothing could be further from the truth. Recent polling finds that only one-third of California’s electorate would vote for Proposition 12 if it was on the ballot today. That’s no surprise when Proposition 12 helped drive the cost of eggs to $10 a dozen earlier this year in California.

Maine’s federal lawmakers — Reps. Chellie Pingree and Jared Golden and Sens. Susan Collins and Angus King — should support a legislative fix to Proposition 12 that keeps California’s laws within California’s borders. Mainers shouldn’t have to pay for a ballot measure they couldn’t even vote on, nor should Maine farmers be subject to the whims of California voters.

Will Coggin
Research Director, Center for the Environment and Welfare
Arlington, Va.