{"id":415203,"date":"2026-07-28T14:07:10","date_gmt":"2026-07-28T14:07:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/415203\/"},"modified":"2026-07-28T14:07:10","modified_gmt":"2026-07-28T14:07:10","slug":"taylor-farms-white-house-ties-queried-by-top-california-democrat-amid-cyclospora-outbreak-the-mercury-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/415203\/","title":{"rendered":"Taylor Farms\u2019 White House ties queried by top California Democrat amid cyclospora outbreak \u2013 The Mercury News"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>By Melos Ambaye, Bloomberg<\/p>\n<p>Representative Robert Garcia, the top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee, is demanding records from Taylor Farms as he questions whether the lettuce producer sought to influence the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mercurynews.com\/2026\/07\/23\/fda-is-investigating-another-cyclospora-parasite-outbreak\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">federal cyclospora investigation<\/a> through its White House ties.<\/p>\n<p>Garcia, in a letter to Taylor Farms Chief Executive Officer Bruce Taylor, questioned whether the company \u201cused its political donations\u201d to interfere with the US Food and Drug Administration\u2019s investigation, according to a statement from the California lawmaker\u2019s office.<\/p>\n<p>Taylor Farms donated more than $2 million to political action committees tied to President Donald Trump and other Republicans in 2025, including $1 million to Trump\u2019s super PAC, Garcia said in the letter. The lawmaker requested communications between the company and the FDA, US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, US Department of Agriculture and the White House related to the outbreak.<\/p>\n<p>Federal officials continue to investigate a cyclospora outbreak linked to Taylor Farms lettuce served at Taco Bell restaurants. The company, one of the largest suppliers of fresh-cut salads and vegetables in North America, recalled products sent to 27 states and suspended all iceberg lettuce purchases from central Mexico.<\/p>\n<p>Taylor Farms did not immediately respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n<p>Mexican authorities said late Thursday that tests on lettuce and water samples from a Taylor Farms facility in Mexico were negative for cyclospora. The FDA said a previously reported false positive involving the company\u2019s lettuce didn\u2019t change the basis for the agency\u2019s ongoing investigation or the overwhelming data supporting the voluntary recall.<\/p>\n<p>Nearly 2,000 confirmed cases across nine states have been linked to the outbreak, the CDC said on Friday, while thousands more infections have been reported to health departments in 41 states. Cyclospora cases rise every summer as the warmer season allows the parasite that causes severe diarrhea to thrive, though typically fewer than 100 people nationwide are diagnosed each year.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013With assistance from Daniela Sirtori.<\/p>\n<p>More stories like this are available on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bloomberg.com\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">bloomberg.com<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u00a92026 Bloomberg L.P.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Melos Ambaye, Bloomberg Representative Robert Garcia, the top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee, is demanding records&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":415204,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[1955,184,387,7,9,8,1751,643,413,1570,1280,181,858,2581,2582,100,13,1748,1969,200,1695],"class_list":["post-415203","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-california","tag-agriculture","tag-bay-area","tag-business","tag-california","tag-california-headlines","tag-california-news","tag-democrats","tag-environment","tag-food","tag-health","tag-health-care","tag-latest-headlines","tag-monterey-county","tag-national-news","tag-national-politics","tag-news","tag-politics","tag-republicans","tag-retail","tag-south-bay","tag-trump-administration"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/415203","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=415203"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/415203\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/415204"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=415203"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=415203"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=415203"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}