Unelected Egg Bureaucrats’ Illegal Power Grab Boils Over

Grant Krueger has been in the restaurant business for 34 years, and he works hard to run outstanding businesses for his customers and employees alike, despite the industry’s razor-thin margins. But in April 2022, the Arizona Department of Agriculture (“AZDA”) made Grant’s job even harder when it short-circuited constitutional separation of powers and took it upon itself to make new law that should have been decided through the democratic process. AZDA enacted a new regulation unilaterally—without consulting the Legislature or the countless Arizonans the regulation would affect— requiring that only cage-free eggs can be produced or sold in Arizona.

The people of Arizona should have a say in whether to adopt sweeping new requirements governing how eggs are produced, what kinds of eggs may be sold, and how much those eggs will cost. AZDA’s decision to unilaterally impose these requirements exemplifies the problems of the undemocratic, unaccountable administrative state that wields so much power over ordinary Americans’ lives. It violates Arizona’s clear constitutional mandate of separation of powers, as well as Arizona statutes forbidding unelected bureaucrats from imposing regulations that aren’t (1) specifically authorized by law and (2) reasonably necessary to carry out a statutory purpose.

The Goldwater Institute and Pacific Legal Foundation have joined forces to challenge this unlawful and unconstitutional regulation, and to defend the rights of Arizonans to limited, democratically-accountable government.