PT19.S2.Q06 - legislator: your agency is responsible for

ThePaperChase

https://7sage.com/lsat_explanations/lsat-19-section-2-question-06/
I hate that I'm getting stumped by a question this early in the section, but I've gotten this wrong both timed and also during blind review. I keep choosing C, although the answer is B:

(paraphrased stimulus)
Legislator: Your agency is responsible for regulating an industry shaken by scandals. We gave you funds for 500 investigators but you only hired 400. I conclude that you intentionally limited hiring in order to prevent the full extent of the scandals from being revealed.
Regulator: No, we tried hiring the 500 investigators, but the starting salaries were frozen so low by the legislature that it was impossible to attract enough qualified applicants.

Q: The regulator responds to the legislator's criticism by...
B. providing info that challenges the legislator's conclusion
C. claiming that complying with the legislature's mandate would have been an insufficient response

I chose C. because the regulator was saying that complying with the legislature's mandate (the one to hire 500 investigators with low frozen salaries) would have been an insufficient response (in combating the scandals)

I see why B would be the right answer since the regulator introduces new information that suggests an alternative explanation, which challenges the legislator's conclusion. I'm just not sure why C is wrong.

Any help would be much appreciated! I have tried to find this explanation or discussion of this question online elsewhere and haven't been able to.

daniel.noah.pearlberg

The legislature's mandate was to hire 500 investigators. The regulator isn't replying by saying that hiring 500 investigators would have been an insufficient response to the scandal (anyways, it would be strange for the regulator to say that- if hiring 500 investigators is insufficient, wouldn't hiring 400 be even worse?). The regulator is saying that they weren't able to hire 500 investigators, due to the low frozen salaries. Which, in turn, challenges the conclusion drawn by the legislator.

ThePaperChase

@daniel.noah.pearlberg thank you! I see, I interpreted it to mean, it was "insufficient" because the people they would have hired if they hired 500 would not have been "qualified enough." But I see your point now, thank you.