Lancaster Farming

By Philip Gruber

The top Democrat on the Senate Agriculture Committee says President Donald Trump is causing needless disruptions to the agriculture industry.

“If this chaos continues, we’re really going to have a hard time,” Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., said at a conference of the National Association of State Departments of Agriculture on Tuesday in Washington.

Klobuchar said she was glad Ag Secretary Brooke Rollins has unfrozen a small amount of grant money the Trump administration had halted.

But Klobuchar said more unfreezing was necessary, and said the funding tie-ups were arbitrary to begin with.

“Our farmers need certainty,” she said.

Rep. Angie Craig, D-Minn., the top Democrat on the House Agriculture Committee, said she is getting daily complaints about USDA not honoring farmer contracts in the Environmental Quality Incentives Program and Rural Energy for America Program.

USDA and other federal agencies have been laying off thousands of federal workers in nonpolitical positions.

Klobuchar said these layoffs, which have largely affected people who were recently hired or promoted, were not based on a careful review of job functions and merit, the way a business would do things.

“They literally cut off some of the most eager, excited new employees,” Klobuchar said.

Klobuchar said she believes in targeted use of tariffs — to combat steel dumping, for example — but said the broad tariffs Trump has proposed on key trading partners could increase farmers’ costs.

Klobuchar said she supports increased resources for border security, as well as immigration reform that makes it easier for farms to bring in workers legally.

Regardless of whether the Trump administration conducts mass deportations in rural areas, the threat that it could do so will affect the ag workforce, she said.

“We know that no great nation has expanded with a shrinking workforce,” Klobuchar said. “We can try to be the first experiment, but I would rather not do that.”

Craig also panned a Republican plan to cut up to $230 billion from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, saying it would hurt demand for farm products.

Passing a Farm Bill is the top priority for the congressional ag committees this year. The bill will require bipartisan support given the GOP’s narrow majorities, but at least the ag committee leaders get along well across party and chamber, Craig said.

Rep. Glenn Thompson, R-Pa., the chairman of the House Agriculture Committee, is scheduled to speak at the ag secretaries’ conference Wednesday.

His Senate counterpart, Sen. John Boozman, R-Ark., was invited to speak at the conference.