DOJ widens beef-price probe to Walmart, Costco, Amazon and five other grocers

The Justice Department Antitrust Division has expanded its beef-price investigation from the four large meatpackers to eight grocery groups. Associate Attorney General Stanley E. Woodward Jr. sent letters to Kroger, Publix, Walmart, Albertsons, Aldi, Ahold Delhaize USA, Costco and Amazon about recent increases in the retail price of beef.

The department said on Tuesday the letters concern affordability at the shop counter. "Beef prices are a critical concern to Americans, and a priority for this Justice Department," it posted. Retail beef is up about 10 percent over the past year on the figures cited in the announcement.

In May the same division opened an antitrust file on JBS, Cargill, Tyson Foods and National Beef, which it says control more than 85 percent of U.S. beef processing. President Donald Trump had accused those firms of collusion and price manipulation. Deputy Assistant Attorney General Nicole Sarrine told an R-CALF USA meeting earlier this year that food and agriculture cases are open in Washington and Chicago.

Documents later described in reporting show the retailer letters asked for pricing strategy and beef margins from 2020 through 2026, costs over the same years, wholesale contracts with packers, and internal analysis of retail and wholesale trends. Company staff were asked to brief investigators.

The administration is running a parallel supply track. A proclamation increased the in-quota volume of lean beef trimmings by 300,000 metric tons for 2026, in three 100,000-ton tranches opening 1 September, 1 October and 31 October. Ranchers in cattle states have objected to the extra imports. The president has said the extra tonnage will bring ground-beef prices down.

Expanding the file from packers to grocers changes the legal map. A packer case is about concentration in slaughter and boxed beef. A retailer case is about how eight chains set shelf prices, pass on wholesale moves and treat private-label ground beef. The letters do not allege a completed offence. They put the chains on notice that margin data from six years will be read in the same building that is already reading packer files.

Agri Stats, a data firm used across protein markets, was forced this year into changes after a Justice Department case over sharing of non-public price and cost detail. That settlement is the backdrop against which grocers now have to decide how much of their own beef analytics to hand over.

Shoppers will not see a court result this autumn. They will see whether the September import tranche and the letters together move the retail print. The department has tied its reputation on food prices to that number.