Consistent with past performance, Donald Trump is failing to live up to promised payments. Before the election, Trump assured farmers he’d dole out $12 billion in a new “Market Facilitation Program” to compensate farmers for the damage done them by his trade war with China. Now with harvest mostly done and farmers losing more money on storing soybeans that won’t sell, Trump is having trouble opening his farm welfare spigot:
According to the Department of Agriculture, just $838 million has been paid out to farmers since the first $6 billion pot of money was made available in September. Another pool of up to $6 billion is expected to become available next month. The government is unlikely to offer additional money beyond the $12 billion, according to Sonny Perdue, the agriculture secretary.
…The dairy industry has been particularly critical of the program and, in a letter to Mr. Perdue, asked the administration to rethink how it calculates subsidies and to make them more generous to dairy farmers. The milk federation expects dairy farmers to lose $1.5 billion from the tariffs in the second half of this year and it has received only $127 million in aid.
“This was supposed to make sure farmers were not the victims of this trade policy,” said Jim Mulhern, president of the National Milk Producers Federation. “I think most agriculture producers feel that the payments have not come close to making up for the damage for the tariffs.”
But some South Dakotans have already cashed in. According to federal records compiled by the Environmental Working Group, Pugh Bros—Rob, Riley, Jay, and Don—of Miller are the top recipients of MFP payments in South Dakota, drawing $207,860. That welfare check nearly doubles the Pughs’ average of $106,000 a year over the last 23 years in federal farm subsidy payments. The Pughs planted 4,600 acres of soybeans in 2016.
The Pugh Bros are among 250 farm outfits nationwide who’ve received six-figure welfare checks from Trump’s tariff apology fund. They are joined in that elite club the following South Dakota operations:
- Supreme Pork Inc of Clear Lake received $125,000 for losses on hogs. That single MFP check is almost twice Supreme Pork’s total farm subsidy haul of $67,719 since 2003. Splitting that check are partners Joel Brandt, Paul Brandt, Laron Krause, Rolland Nevins, and South Dakota Corn Growers vice-president and Hamlin County Commissioner Douglas Noem.
- Jerome Mack Farms LLC of Leola received $125,000 for losses on hogs. Jerome Mack also designs robots and runs a hunting lodge with exclusive access to 4,500 acres. Mack is only a recent farm welfare recipient, taking $209,351 in crop subsidies since 2013.
- The David Russell Salmen Revocable Living Trust of Wessington Springs received $125,000 for soybeans.
- Mitch Truebenbach of Frederick received $122,584 for hogs. Truebenbach owns AgriSwine Alliance and co-owns AgriCare Nutrition.
- Stephany Kay Kopman and Leonard Edward Kopman, a married couple from Bryant who jointly farm in Hamlin, Beadle, and Kingsbury counties in South Dakota and Lac Qui Parle County in Minnesota, each received $114,023 for soybeans. Stephany Kopman had $2,500 to spare for Kristi Noem at the big Trump-Noem campaign event in Sioux Falls in September.
- Poinsett Hutterian Brethren Inc. of Estelline received $111,372 for soybeans. Since 1995, our good Christian socialist neighbors have enjoyed $1,998,265 in farm subsidies.
- R&B Mielke Inc of Conde received $108,306 for soybeans. Owners Rees and Bonnie Mielke have taken over $1.8 million in farm welfare since 1995.
- Collins Hutterian Brethren Inc. of Iroquois received $105,604 for soybeans.
- Kraig Jackson of Zell received $103,958 for soybeans. Prior to this check, Kraig Jackson had taken over $1.1 million in farm welfare checks.
- Upland Hutterian Brethren Inc. of Artesian received $103.561 for hogs. This Hutterite Colony has taken over $2.5 million in farm welfare since 1995.
South Dakota farm operations have received a total of $19.4 million from the Trump tariff apology fund so far, or 5.457% of total MFP disbursements. Ours is the sixth-largest statewide welfare haul, behind Indiana ($19.8M), Nebraska ($25.9M), Iowa ($30.9M), Minnesota ($43.3M), and Illinois (63.7M).
I was unable to find the searchable EWG page with specific information on the Trump tariff payments. Could you provide the searchable link to 2018 tariff payment data not historic data from years prior to 2018.
Why don’t those folks listed get a job? I wonder why I have to use MY taxpayer dollars to support a bunch of serial, unemployed abusers. There has to be a treatment center for this addiction.
Nick, I don’t think EWG has posted that data in searchable form yet. Their news release on the topic has a link to their downloadable spreadsheet, which has 87,696 records. That’s what I used to get the above SD data.
Speaking of Supreme Pork, Joel and Paul Brandt also own half of Brandt Farms Inc, which got $64,876 in tariff bailout cash.
EWG reports 558 MFP payments of $10K or more to South Dakota operations.
“Market Facilitation Program”—because we’re “facilitating” the “market” by giving farmers more government payments.
The article is actually informing all you knuckleheads what little impact the “supposed” trade war is having on farmers since the use of the funds is based upon a farmer applying for the help and clearly very few have even applied.
Maybe a better title would have been “South Dakota Farmers Only Applied for 3.2% ($19.4M) in Trump Farm Welfare Payments out of the $6 BILLION available!”.
OS-perhaps even better is the fact that “farmin’ the government” pays off so well for a few! The people with their hands out to government for “help ($$$$) usually race each other to this public taxpayer trough. And then seem to scream the loudest if a poor single mother with 3 kids buys one of them a candy bar with food stamps (handouts from the hardworking farmer taxpayer!)
Wow All I can say is WOW. How a Red State can accept a Government Handout is beyond me. If your a Trump supporter and a Republican then stick to your values and your principles and don’t accept welfare. Why should tax dollars even be going to farmers at all? Talk about Welfare Queens.
Before anyone says otherwise, the Hutterian paternalistic societies have as much entitlement to entitlements as the rest of the entitled.
How many SD farmers have applied, OldSarg? You write like you know all about it.
Rorsachy~ “How many SD farmers have applied”. Why don’t you look it up yourself? Don’t be so lazy. No one needs to hold your hand through the difficulties of Google. . .
Jake~ Are you ok? Your post makes no sense.
I thought for a moment you knew what you were talking about, OldSarg. I should have known you were just spouting nonsense again.
Iowa State University study calculates $2.2B in losses for Iowa farmers due to tariffs.
The fact that farmers don’t apply for or don’t receive welfare checks does not negate the fact that they are getting less money for their soybeans this year, if they are able to find a buyer at all, due to Donald Trump’s closing of our access to the Chinese market.
Farmer’s what you got is all you’re gonna get too. So the feller’s that got the two dollar check, ya ain’t gonna double it.
“President Trump is demanding top advisers craft a plan to reduce the country’s ballooning budget deficits, but the president has flummoxed his own aides by repeatedly seeking new spending while ruling out measures needed to address the country’s unbalanced budget.
Trump’s deficit-reduction directive came last month, after the White House reported a large increase in the deficit for the previous 12 months. The announcement unnerved Republicans and investors, helping fuel a big sell-off in the stock market. Two days after the deficit report, Trump floated a surprise demand to his Cabinet secretaries, asking them to identify steep cuts in their agencies.” Washington Post 11/25/2018
Proof positive that there is certainly open drug abuse happening at the highest (pun intended) levels in the regime. Farm Bill, not likely with this claptrap, until the Democrats take over.
It’s so interesting that an individual who lost her job due to severe illness is labeled a bum for accepting EBD (food stamps). She didn’t choose the illness or do anything to cause it. She sure didn’t want to spent 3 weeks hospitalized, but things happen that are beyond one’s control.
A farmer doesn’t diversify his crops, planting nearly all soy beans, with a little corn thrown in. He sold his livestock several years ago, figuring the big money was in corn and beans. It worked well, till it didn’t. He had choices and made them freely. Some have come back to bite him. Now he’s a welfare queen.
[I still support farmers, always have. I’m pointing out the hypocrisy of trying to differentiate between 2 recipients of government aid. Perhaps the only real difference is that she recognizes that government assistance is helping her through a rough spot, while he pretends that’s somehow not true, just in his case.]
It’s not only SD.
Minneapolis Star Tribune:
“Eighty-four farms filed for Chapter 12 bankruptcy in Wisconsin, Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota and Montana in the 12 months that ended in June, according to a new analysis from the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. That’s more than double the number over the same period in 2013 and 2014, and the number of bankruptcies in Minnesota doubled over the past four years from eight to 20.
“Banks are also seeing more farm borrowers fall behind on their payments, and the worst is likely yet to come.”
https://goo.gl/VrKEDB
There’s a link to the Federal Reserve analysis in the article.
The dairy farmers are going bust too.
“Nearly one out of 10 Minnesota dairy farmers have exited the business in the past 12 months, according to the Minnesota Milk Producers Association, and retaliatory tariffs by China and others against the U.S. have exacerbated an already dire situation.”
Dairy farmers in Minnesota have only gotten about 10% of their losses reimbursed by MFP. IOW, it’s a cruel joke played on rural areas by the Tantrum Toddler.
https://goo.gl/cXQsuy
Outstanding links Ms. Debbo and very devasting for ag producers. Farmers should unionize and work together to break this chain that binds them to uncertainty. In Europe, farmers work together to make sure they are respected. The 5% cut over 5 years is the result of Brexit, another Russian special operations just like here.
“The CAP proposal comes as part of a bigger, new, multi-year EU budget set to trigger battles among member states over how to fill the funding gap left by Britain’s exit next year.
In an effort to cut costs and promote other policies, farmers will see aid shrink in the 2021-2027 period to 365 billion euros ($438 billion), down 5 percent from the current CAP, the Commission said.
This would represent a share of less than 30 percent of the total budget of 1.28 trillion euros in inflation-adjusted prices, down from more than 45 percent 20 years earlier.”
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-eu-budget-agriculture/eu-proposes-to-cut-farm-subsidies-france-says-unacceptable-idUSKBN1I31XB
https://thehill.com/policy/finance/418263-farm-bankruptcies-on-the-rise-according-to-new-fed-report
I am officially on hiatus from commenting until further notice from Saturday evening.