Congress Plans to Scrap USDA Climate Hubs, Following Trump Guidance

By Cami Koons

Not all farmers and ranchers will agree in a discussion about climate change, but it would be difficult to find a Midwest producer who did not value climate-related data addressing drought, precipitation, temperature, and frost outlooks. 

These are all pieces of data gathered and distributed by the Ames-based Midwest Climate Hub, which along with the other 10 regional climate hubs under the USDA, is slated to be cut from the federal agriculture budget. 

The U.S. House appropriations bill that sets the 2026 fiscal year budgets for agriculture, rural development, food and drug administration, and related agencies includes “no funds for climate hubs or climate corps.” 

The summary of the bill, which closely follows budget requests from President Donald Trump, says it “safeguards American taxpayer dollars and preserves core functions” by eliminating funding for climate hubs, among other changes. 

Eleven regional climate hubs were established as interagency departments by USDA in 2014 with the goal of coordinating across USDA agencies, and with U.S. producers, on climate resiliency strategies.

Lowering the Information Barrier

Laurie Nowatzke was formerly the associate director of the Midwest Climate Hub, before she was terminated in February and then brought back in March briefly before she took the second deferred resignation program offered to federal employees.

Nowatzke said part of her role at the hub was to “bridge” on-the-ground responses and needs of producers to USDA research, and vice versa.

Each climate hub is a little different, depending on the needs of their region, but Nowatzke said climate, in its most basic form relating to weather patterns, was a big focus for the Midwest.

“A huge focus of ours was taking that sort of experienced climate and weather conditions and how that applies or affects agriculture,” Nowatzke said.

This is most seen through the ag-focus climate outlooks the hub put out monthly, and weekly during crop season.

Nowatzke said as of the end of April when she left the office, staff were not allowed to update content on the website and have instead continued to send the outlooks via email to subscribers.

She said the climate outlooks were a “key product” the hub put out that producers and stakeholders said was especially helpful to contextualize the “vast array of climate and weather data” available from outlets like the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Rod Pierce, a long-time corn and soybean farmer in central Iowa, said the outlooks help him with both long- and short-term planning in his operation. They help him answer questions such as when is the last frost so he can plant, is it going to be dry, and importantly, what conditions are other Midwestern states facing that he should take into account when marketing his commodities.

“Weather is so important in us making decisions, trying to look at the trend for the year … do I want to grow corn or beans … it just helps put some of that stuff in line,” Pierce said.

He said the hub reports give him a “big picture” of trends in the region, and he feels the information is trustworthy.

“We know the people that are doing it are not just blowing smoke,” Pierce said. “It’s good data, it’s researched data.”

Alli Wenman, the regional climate outreach project manager for the University of Wisconsin–Madison’s extension, said in interviews with extension office managers and educators throughout the Midwest, she learned access to training and applicable information were the top tools these professionals said they needed to discuss the impacts of climate change with producers in their regions. 

“They need to know the climate science … but they also need to know the social science, like, how do I facilitate that conversation around climate,” Wenman said. “The hub has that information and has the capacity to build those tools, the capacity to build those trainings.” 

Wenman spoke with these professionals as part of a project, funded by USDA, to forge connections between university extension programs and the climate hubs and work toward greater agricultural resilience in the face of climate change. 

She said the partnership with the Midwest Climate Hub was “key” to cut through the “noise” at the research level and give producers the tools and data that matter most to their operations. 

Wenman said the ag-focused climate outlooks have become a trustworthy source of information for a lot of producers. 

“The information is out there, but it’s maybe not framed for ag,” Wenman said. “There’s too much information, so they help us sort through what information is relevant for ag and put it into ag terms.”

The reports pull information from nearly a dozen agencies and compile it into a four-page report full of climate, crop, and soil moisture information and graphics. 

A spokesperson for U.S. Rep. Ashley Hinson, R-Iowa, who served on the subcommittee that passed the bill, said the hubs are a “duplicative” program and the same research can be conducted through competitive agriculture research programs that are already funded by the federal government and supported by the House’s newest bill. 

The bill’s report shows it would terminate the funding for climate hubs and climate corps, which were initiated under former President Joe Biden to train young people for high-demand clean energy jobs. 

“The bill maintains critical funding to ensure we have the safest food, drugs, and devices in the world and puts America’s farmers, ranchers, and rural communities first,” the bill report reads. 

Hinson, in a statement, said “farmers felt like they were screaming into a void” as the the Biden administration “focused on DEI and radical climate policies” while farmers’ “real needs were ignored.” 

“This bill cuts wasteful spending — including for so-called “climate hubs” — and champions President Trump’s farmer-first agenda to strengthen longstanding research programs, support rural businesses and infrastructure, and safeguard our food supply,” Hinson said. “I will continue to support farmer-led conservation initiatives to ensure Iowa producers are empowered with conservation tools and have all the resources they need to feed and fuel the world.”

The House appropriations committee also tried to reject funding for the hubs in its FY25 budget bill, though the Senate’s version expanded funding for the program. Because Congress has failed to pass appropriations bills, the government has been operating on continuing spending resolutions based on the fiscal year 2024 budget.

The Senate passed the massive, budget reconciliation package, known as the “One Big Beautiful Bill” Tuesday which sets mandatory spending over a 10-year span. The appropriations bills, like the House-proposed ag bill, are separate budgets that deal with discretionary spending in the agencies. 

Reports Form the Hub

While the climate outlook reports are what many Midwest producers might know the hub for, the regional hubs also produced reports on the impacts of climate change, and mitigation strategies, on agriculture, forestry, Tribal lands, wetlands, and other region-specific areas.

Nowatzke said funding from the Inflation Reduction Act of the Biden administration helped the hub to “really chip away” at climate mitigation concerns and greenhouse gas emissions.

“So (the hub was) starting to move beyond just dealing with climate change or near-term weather events, but also addressing agriculture’s impact on climate change as well,” Nowatzke said. 

The Midwest Climate Hub produced reports like “Climate Change Impacts on Iowa Agriculture” and similar reports for eight Midwestern states. The reports calculated long-term changes in temperature, precipitation, growing season length and the impacts these have had, and are projected to have, on agriculture. 

Nowatzke said these reports also employed feedback from on-the-ground folks at extension offices, crop physiologists and farmers to determine the strategies that would be helpful for a farm trying to deal with a changing climate.  

The hub also explored, and produced, reports on topics such as: the relationship between climate change and specialty crops in the Midwest and a guide on managing the risks of field and equipment fires which are exacerbated by drought conditions.

The hub, in collaboration with on Midwestern Regional Climate Center, also reported and developed interactive tools for farmers on soil temperature and frost dates. 

Nowatzke said while the climate hub sits on a congressional chopping block, and has already dealt with cuts to staff and programs, most of the hub’s collaborating agencies have also been hit by federal cuts. 

She said without the hubs, this climate research at other agencies could persist, but she expects USDA would struggle in “delivering the science that they do, to the people that they’re developing the science for.” 

“Researchers serve a really important role in developing that work and publishing it, but also we need professionals who are trained and capable and have capacity to actually disseminate that in ways that people can use it,” Nowatzke said. 

Wenman said this is what she hears from other extension officers and producers who, while they might not use the term climate change, are seeking tools to help adapt to more extreme weather, drought patterns and other associated effects of a changing climate. Wenman said the hub information is “actionable” and the “stuff that really matters to people.”

“Extension is trying to prepare our staff to better help farmers deal with the effects of changing climate conditions,” Wenman said. “Losing the hub would seriously hinder our ability to continue to do our jobs well within that realm.”

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