Trump Admin Still Planning Billions in Farmer Trade Aid

By Ryan Hanrahan

Politico’s Grace Yarrow and Meredith Lee Hill reported late last week that “the Trump administration plans to roll out an initial payment of up to $12 billion for farmers hurt by the president’s tariff policies once the government shutdown ends, according to three people familiar with the matter. The finalized amount will come on top of President Donald Trump’s recently announced truce with China, which could also give some relief to U.S. producers of soybeans, sorghum and meat.”

“Sen. John Hoeven, R-N.D., told reporters Thursday that a Market Facilitation Program — similar to the $28 billion farmer bailout Trump issued during his first-term trade wars — is ‘all teed up and good to go,’” Yarrow and Lee Hill reported. “‘That’s being held up by the shutdown,’ Hoeven added.”

“Farmers have been grappling with tariff uncertainty, high costs for things like fertilizer and machinery, rising inflation, and other economic headwinds as they start to make decisions for next year’s planting season,” Yarrow and Lee Hill reported. “That’s added pressure on lawmakers and administration officials who’ve been working for months to ready some sort of bailout and open new trade markets.”

AgWeb’s Michelle Rook reported that USDA Deputy Secretary Stephen Vaden recently confirmed the aid won’t come until after the government shutdown ends. “‘Until the government re-opens, we don’t have appropriations, and there’s no money to be had, whether you’re talking about recipients of our SNAP program or you’re talking about farmers who may need additional assistance for a bridge to get to next year,’” Vaden told Chip Flory on “AgriTalk,” according to Rook’s reporting.

“While appearing on “AgriTalk,” Vaden seemed to walk back the extent of the aid in light of the market reaction to trade frameworks and purchases from China and other export customers,” Rook reported. “‘Obviously, we need to see how the markets respond, and as the Secretary has already noted, we need to have, we may need to have, a bridge to next year, but how many lanes that bridge has is going to be determined by what the market does between now and then,’ he explains.”

Brownfield’s Carah Hart reported that “the co-director of the Ag and Food Policy Center at Texas A&M says U.S. farmers still need federal assistance despite last week’s new trade framework between the U.S. and China. Bart Fischer says the agreement is a positive step in reducing trade uncertainty, but it doesn’t address high input costs.”

“‘We’re still dealing with the carryover effects from inflation over the last four to five years,’ Fischer said,” according to Hart’s reporting. “Fischer says he’s expecting the Trump administration and Congress to continue their discussions on both economic and trade assistance as separate, but related issues. ‘The need for trade assistance, I think, is largely going to depend on how the market ultimately ends up responding and how that translates into, you know, to price improvement,’ he said.”

USDA Transfers Money for Future Tariff Relief

Government Executive’s Eric Katz reported that “the Agriculture Department moved $13 billion from an account designed to support farmers into another designed to provide emergency relief from President Trump’s tariffs, but the funding is now largely sitting in limbo without any immediate function.”

“The transfer has raised some concerns on Capitol Hill as USDA did not notify lawmakers of the funding shift, over the objections of career staff who said such an alert was required,” Katz reported. “The move has also drawn attention as some key programs to aid farmers — which would otherwise have operated normally despite the government shutdown — no longer have sufficient funds to continue.”

“USDA transferred the $13 billion from its Commodity Credit Corporation — a New Deal-era initiative that funds the purchasing of and aid toward U.S. agricultural products — to the Office of the Secretary, according to internal emails obtained by Government Executive, public spending data and individuals privy to the decision making,” Katz reported. “The money was sent to create a mandatory ‘Farmers Support Program,’ according to documents marking the transfer, though an employee familiar with the matter said the tariff relief effort was not yet ready for actual deployment.”

Trump Admin Still Planning Billions in Farmer Trade Aid was originally published by Farmdoc.