LEXINGTON, NE — Today, independent candidate for U.S. Senate Dan Osborn released the following statement:
“I’d like to congratulate Pete Ricketts for graduating from simply ‘thoughts and prayers’ to recognizing that Tyson may have broken the law. Perhaps he’ll be willing to raise that concern with his catalog of donors from the meat packing industry the next time he crawls to them for money.
“Tyson’s closure has raised alarm bells for antitrust experts and sent long-time employees at the plant into a panic. If the initial reaction to the closure news by Nebraska’s federal delegation wasn’t concerning enough, the ensuing chorus of whining from them since I visited Lexington has been disqualifying.
“Ricketts keeps saying he’s treating this closure as a natural disaster, but this disaster was created by unchecked corporate greed and a lack of leaders who are willing to enforce the antitrust laws we already have on the books. Unsurprisingly, he’s more committed to protecting the hand that feeds his campaign war chest instead of Nebraska workers.
“Law and order applies to corporations like Tyson, too. In that regard, Pete is about as weak on crime as Joe Biden was on the border.”
Yesterday, Ricketts acknowledged in a press conference the possibility of Tyson being in violation of the Packers and Stockyards Act, one day after Osborn called on the United States Department of Agriculture and the United States Department of Justice to file a lawsuit under the Packers and Stockyards Act to compel Tyson to sell its plant to a competitor.
Ricketts’ campaigns have taken $71,500 from Tyson since 2014.
