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Banks digs heels into price gouging ruling in latest U.S. Senate campaign attack against Rust

By Casey Smith, Indiana Capital Chronicle

Posted December 15, 2023

The latest ad buy from U.S. Rep. Jim Banks’s Senate campaign — titled “Say No to Shady John Rust” — takes aim at his GOP contender, whose family egg farm was recently found by a federal jury to have purposefully manipulated its supply with competitors to increase the price of eggs. (Screenshot from Banks’ digital campaign ad)

In his latest campaign ad, U.S. Rep. Jim Banks yet again took aim at GOP challenger John Rust, this time spotlighting a recent federal jury’s ruling that the sixth-generation Indiana egg farmer and his business were involved in a conspiracy to price gouge eggs.

Banks has repeatedly accused Rust of funding his U.S. Senate campaign with money earned from the scheme while Hoosiers struggle to make ends meet due to record inflation.

Last month, a jury found that Rust’s embattled family farm, Rose Acre Farms, one of the nation’s largest egg distributors, had purposefully manipulated its supply with competitors to increase the price of eggs. The egg farms have been fined millions.

Rust stepped down from the Rose Acre board earlier this year.

“Hardworking families in Indiana had to pay more to put food on the table during the pandemic because of John Rust and his mega-corporation Rose Acre Farms. And now he’s using that money to try to buy a U.S. Senate race in Indiana,” Banks said in the ad buy.

It ends with the tagline “say no to shady John Rust.”

Rust told the Indiana Capital Chronicle Banks’ statements amount to “pure political hogwash.”

“Jim Banks is scared to death of a farmer standing up to the establishment. He is the willing lapdog of Mitch McConnell. He is scared because he knows his voting record of voting exactly opposite of what he says in Indiana is being called out. He is scared because he has repeatedly missed major votes in Congress,” Rust said. “Hoosiers are sick of part-time, career politicians who only have to work two to three days per week and don’t even show up for those days.”

“I’m bringing the work ethic of a farmer to Washington to clean up the mess and expose the swamp,” he continued. “Jim Banks gulps the swamp water of Washington, D.C. eagerly with both hands.”

Rust, running to succeed U.S. Sen. Mike Braun, currently can’t appear on the Republican ballot because of a law prohibiting candidates whose last two primary votes don’t match the party they wish to represent.

The candidate’s underdog campaign had a win earlier this month, however, after a Marion County judge issued an injunction, finding that a state law limiting who can run on a primary ballot is unconstitutional. The court also simultaneously denied the state’s motion to dismiss Rust’s lawsuit altogether.

Rust’s two most recent primary votes were Republican in 2016 and Democrat in 2012 — meaning he can’t appear on the Republican ballot for the 2024 May primary election. The law allows an exception, should the county’s party chair grant it. Jackson County Republican Party Chair Amanda Lowery elected not to do so in this case because of the two-primary rule, according to court documents.

The state has already appealed the ruling to the Indiana Supreme Court.

Banks has already earned an endorsement from the Indiana Republican Party for his 2024 U.S. Senate bid — marking the first time in recent history that the state party has made an endorsement before primary elections for an open seat.