Two Iowa egg producers have been forced to recall more than half a billion eggs following a salmonella outbreak that has sickened close to 1,000 people. According to FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg, the companies involved fell short of safety standards at their farms. On Sunday, Hamburg told CNN, "there's no question these farms involved in the recall were not operating with the standards of practice we consider responsible." The salmonella outbreak has been traced back to two Iowa egg farms, Hillandale farms and Wright County Egg.

Hillandale Farms released a statement Sunday saying, "we are devastated that our eggs have been implicated in making people sick. We have never had a product recall in our 45-year history, and it flies in the face of our mission to provide wholesome, nutritious food for the American public." Wright County Egg, which is owned by the DeCoster family, doesn't have quite as sparkling a record. Over the past several years, companies owned by the DeCoster's have been charged with and admitted to animal cruelty, have been fined for maintaining "sweatshop conditions" for migrant workers, have been embroiled in a sexual assault case and have been charged by the Iowa attorney general as an "habitual violator" of state laws in after a series of discharges of manure from their hog-farming business.

Today, a key member of Congress plans to send a letter to federal regulators seeking an explanation of what knowledge they had about the two Iowa egg producers that are at the center of this massive recall. Rep. Rose DeLauro (D-CT) letter will ask the Food and Drug Administration as well as the Department of Agriculture about Austin "Jack" DeCoster, the owner of Wright County Egg. DeCoster not only owns Wright County Eggs that recalled 380 million eggs last week but also has close ties to Hillandale Farms which recalled 170 million eggs last Friday that had been distributed to 14 states in the west and midwest. DeLauro hopes the two agencies' answers to her questions will shed light on how much federal regulators knew about DeCoster's poor compliance record.

Egg Recall Exposes Gaps in Federal Oversight