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Before you can reap an abundant harvest, you have to put in the hard work of tilling the soil, sowing good seed, and waiting for it to take root. No one understands that better than our farmers.
In my 50 days as USDA secretary, I’ve become convinced American farmers, ranchers, and producers have been some of the hardest hit by failed policies and a lack of leadership from Washington over the last four years. That’s why President Trump and I are fighting every day for farmers so that American agriculture will be prosperous for generations to come.
Like every other federal agency wrecked by disastrous policy decisions under the Biden administration, we at USDA inherited a mismanaged department that was not fulfilling its mission, but was instead focused on expanding woke policy initiatives such as diversity, equity, and inclusion. American farmers have been paying the price of these misplaced policy priorities.
With an unprecedented agricultural trade deficit approaching $50 billion after four years of the United States seated on the sidelines of trade negotiations, farmers picked President Trump to change the status quo and return us to the trade surplus he handed to the last administration. American farmers have been hurt by the Biden administration’s failure to enforce the Phase One trade agreement signed by China under President Trump’s watch and the administration’s silence in response to the EU’s arbitrary non-tariff barriers on American producers.
That’s exactly why President Trump is taking action. He knows farmers need to be treated fairly instead of facing unjustified barriers like Brazil’s 18% tariff on imported ethanol or Canada’s restrictive quotas, which tariff milk as high as 313%. Our farmers, ranchers, and producers are the backbone of our nation’s economy and deserve a level playing field.
At USDA, we are meeting the challenge head-on and holding our trading partners accountable. That’s why I’ve announced an aggressive international travel agenda to expand market access and to reassert what our great farmers produce for the world. In the next six months, I’ll travel to India, Brazil, the United Kingdom, Japan, Vietnam, and Peru to give voice to American farmers who have been neglected in trade negotiations. My team will also host additional trade missions in Hong Kong, the Dominican Republic, Taiwan, Cote d’Ivoire, and Mexico.
Reversing disastrous trade policies won’t be easy, and it won’t happen overnight. President Trump is the ultimate dealmaker and together we will ensure our farmers are treated fairly by our trading partners.
At the same time, we continue to respond to the ever-evolving needs of our farmers and ranchers here at home as they continue to produce the safest, most abundant food supply in the world. Your voice is being heard in Washington once again, and we immediately began to take action to ensure farmers and ranchers have the tools needed to enter this new golden age of American prosperity.
Over the course of the last 50 days, working closely with DOGE, the USDA has been hyper-focused on canceling contracts and grants from the previous administration that no longer align with our mission and are not effectively serving American farmers, ranchers, and producers. We are realigning our focus on programs our constituents actually need.
We have directed Congressionally authorized payments through the Emergency Commodity Assistance Program (ECAP) to help our farmers respond to increased input costs and falling commodity prices.
We have launched an aggressive plan to respond to the bird flu outbreak by providing federal aid to farmers to help them quickly accelerate repopulation and have completed 336 biosecurity assessments on farms across 15 states since our plan launched. We have rolled out a funding opportunity to find a long-term solution to stopping the bird flu once and for all and find a long-term solution through therapeutics, vaccines, or other innovations.
We are taking action to ease burdens on pork and poultry industries to enhance line speed efficiency and rid facilities of burdensome, unnecessary, and duplicative reporting thereby increasing productivity.
We approved the distribution of federal funds to provide fresh fruits and vegetables for food banks through USDA’s Congressionally authorized Section 32 funds.
And we took action to release a biofuels incentive program across 29 states which help unleash American energy and incentivize the production and use of homegrown U.S. biofuels. To that end, USDA is committed to working alongside the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to develop Renewable Volume Obligations (RVO) that support the biofuel industry and to support EPA’s review of any potential emergency fuel waivers to allow the nationwide year-round sale of E15. In the current agricultural economy, U.S. biofuels remain a bright spot and tremendous opportunity.
As President Trump works to rebalance our current trade deals and expand market access around the world, USDA has the backs of our farmers, ranchers, and producers as they enter the spring planting season.
American farmers made their voices heard, and their president is back. Under his leadership, they will always have a voice in Washington.
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