We continue our coverage from the national association of Farm Broadcasting Convention in Kansas City with Rob Larew, President of the National Farmers Union.
Q: I know we just talked a couple weeks ago and my, oh my, things have changed the landscape of ag politics and more just in a matter of a couple of weeks. We know who’s in the White House come January as President Trump getting reelected to a second term and looking at the rollout of his cabinet. We’re seeing this by the minute. Names are being announced and we have a few names out there for certainty. We don’t know Secretary of Ag yet.
But just looking at this thousand foot view here, we got plenty of ag issues that we got to tackle. What are your thoughts on a new Trump administration coming in here, Rob?
RL: Well, I think we expected that Trump in this new administration would hit the ground running, right? They a lot of the folks around his team have a great deal of experience at this now. And so they certainly claim that they have no time to waste and they want to try to get their cabinet filled out as quickly as possible.
What we’ve already seen with some of the nominees that have been put out there is that you have folks who are trying to respond to what they feel is a message from voters that they want reform, they want changes. And so as we look at EPA and other places, I think that’s going to be a theme that we continue to see within ag. It’s actually a little bit of an interesting game because we now have well over a dozen names that I think are being kind of scattered around there. I think it’s really a guessing game at this point. There’s a lot of differences between the experience that they bring and what agenda they might have.
So I think for farmers, there’s still a big question about what USDA is going to look like, but you really hit it in saying that farmers and ranchers have things they need to get done. Now we have this farm bill that we’ve been talking about for way too long and unfortunately, it’s not finished yet. I think it’s going to be a super heavy lift to get that done by the end of the year. But you know what? Farmers and ranchers believe that we can’t afford not to get it done right now.
Q: Well, and I’m glad you bring that up. I had this conversation with a few folks. I said the lame duck session of Congress here, we got about 20 some days where we have to get appropriations done, we have to defense authorization. I believe farm bills hanging out there. I mean the prospects of getting this done before the end of the year seem very slim.
It seems like we’ll get another extension and then the new Congress is going to take up this farm bill issue. But I mean, are you hearing anything different? Is there still a chance that we could get something done before the end of the year here?
RL: I think we have to keep pushing because if we stop pushing, we know that the chance of getting this done in a lame duck session is zero. We know that the pressure is great. We know that there’s a lot of competing issues out there, but we’ve got to keep the pressure up. Farmers and ranchers have a ton of stress out there. We have the disasters that we’re dealing with. We have price issues and we have the uncertainty of a farm bill out there.
What I worry is that we might end the year with not only the lack of a five-year farm bill, but maybe even the lack of a further extension which just puts uncertainty into next year.
Q: Well, that’s a great point too. If we don’t get an extension, we’re going to go back to price levels and supports that, 1940s I believe? Am I saying that right?
RL: You know this so-called permanent law used to be one of the threats that was with members of Congress that forced them to try to get the five year farm bill done, we’ve bumped up against that in the years past.
And unfortunately while there are some things that go into effect in a few months when we don’t have a farm bill when it lapses, that threat is pretty weak at this point, I would argue. And unfortunately, I think inaction by Congress right now is just leaving the farmers and ranchers at loss.
Q: Outside of farm bill, obviously such a huge topic. Other issues though the NFU is watching and thinking about a new administration coming in? Does that change the way you guys look at some things, some other things you’re watching? I mean what else is out there you’re paying attention to right now?
RL: So we know that next year the agenda is going to be pretty massive and I think very aggressive for President Elect Trump and his team and Congress. Congress has certainly talked about tackling things like the expiring tax cuts that are out there.
So that certainly has a lot of impact on farmers and ranchers out there. We’ll be tracking that very carefully. Some provisions in there that have the potential to either help or hurt farmer owned cooperatives, there are a lot of those provisions that we’re going to be looking at in the new year. Certainly, if we are seeing some regulatory reform in areas like EPA or USDA will be tracking that as well. But transition, it is all about transition right now.
And as we see new leadership being elected in the House and the Senate, that’s where we’re going to be putting a lot of attention to, to make sure that they understand what farmers and ranchers really need out there and whether it’s making sure that we have tax policy that is going to benefit them, making sure that we have programs that provide relative safety for them, making sure that we have fair and competitive markets. These issues that are still out there, like farmers not being able to repair their own equipment, issues around there about the con, the mergers and the consolidation and agriculture, those are things that have been with us for a few decades. We’ve made a little bit of progress and we have bipartisan support. So those are the other issues that Farmers Union is going to be pushing as we get into the new year.
Q: You bring up right to repair. And I wanted to ask you this too. I know in other areas, not ag related, that President Trump has indicated in the past that he likes to leave the issue up to the states. That’s where we’re at currently, as we have, you know, a few states that have right to repair laws on the books, while many don’t. Are you concerned that he could continue to leave that issue up to the states moving forward?
RL: Well, I don’t think that’s necessarily a bad thing.
I do think that right now, given the reluctance by some of the farm equipment manufacturers to truly give free rein for farmers to be able to either repair their own equipment or seek independent repair and make sure that they can get those repairs done quicker and more cost effective, I think that whether it’s trying to get a patchwork of right to repair across the country and so forth, we still have the opportunity for these farm manufacturers to actually step up and be honest about this and truly make right to repair effectively the law of the land with automobiles.
It wasn’t that many years ago that there was a threat from the auto industry that was going to limit right to repair and require everybody to take their automobiles back to the dealer, back to the dealer to make sure that they get that repair and really limit any ability for folks to work on it themselves or take it to an independent mechanic. Can you imagine, Massachusetts passed a law that gave automobile owners the right to repair. The industry said, you know what, we get it. We’re going to back off.
We still have that opportunity here with the farm equipment manufacturers. They’ve signed some MOUs in the past. They’ve made some promises. Now we just need them to actually make that true.
