President Donald Trump said this week he “loved” America’s cattle ranchers. But those farmers, who overwhelmingly supported the president in the 2024 election, say they aren’t feeling the love right now.
Trump is facing criticism from many US cattle ranchers after signaling support for increasing low-tariff beef imports from Argentina to ease record beef prices in the United States. The move comes just weeks after US soybean farmers blasted a separate deal with Argentina that they fear will give South American producers a competitive edge in that market.
Argentina currently accounts for just over 2% of US beef imports. Under existing rules, it can ship up to 20,000 metric tons a year at a lower tariff rate, with anything above that subject to a 26.4% tariff, according to the US Department of Agriculture.
A White House official told CNN the administration plans to raise that quota to 80,000 metric tons, effectively quadrupling the amount of Argentinian beef with low tariffs that can enter the United States.
“If Trump goes through with what he outlined, I do believe it’s a betrayal of the American rancher,” Christian Lovell, an Illinois cattle farmer and the senior director of programs at Farm Action, a nonpartisan farm organization, said. “It’s a feeling that you’re selling us out to a foreign competitor.”
On Wednesday, Trump reacted to the backlash from cattle ranchers.
“The Cattle Ranchers, who I love, don’t understand that the only reason they are doing so well, for the first time in decades, is because I put Tariffs on cattle coming into the United States, including a 50% Tariff on Brazil,” Trump wrote on social media.
“It would be nice if they would understand that, but they also have to get their prices down, because the consumer is a very big factor in my thinking, also!” he added.
In a statement, Colin Woodall, CEO of the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association, a trade association for beef producers, said the organization and its members “cannot stand behind the President while he undercuts the future of family farmers and ranchers by importing Argentinian beef in an attempt to influence prices.”
The price of beef has climbed significantly this year, up nearly 14% in the past year, according to the latest inflation data released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics in August. (A fresh read on consumer prices is set to be released Friday.)
Becca Jablonski, an agricultural economist who teaches at Cornell University’s Johnson School of Business, said the price increase is fueled by multiple factors.
A recent, multi-year drought decreased the amount of grazing land for cattle and made feed grain significantly more expensive, resulting in a shortage of cattle, she said.
The shortage has also been made worse by an infestation of New World screwworm, a flesh-eating parasite, just across the border in Mexico, significantly curtailing beef imports from that country.
Jablonski said that historically the livestock sector barely makes money, but is having a rare positive year, which allows farmers to pay down debts they accrued during unprofitable years.
“I think the argument the industry is making is, ‘Let us have one good year,’” she said.
In a statement, White House spokesperson Anna Kelly said the president is keeping his promises to defend farmers and consumers.
“President Trump pledged to protect America’s ranchers and deliver economic relief for everyday Americans. The Administration is accomplishing both by expanding beef imports from Argentina to lower consumer prices in the short term while rolling out a new USDA initiative that will support ranchers and expand cattle herd sizes to keep prices lower in the long term,” Kelly said.
Lovell said many of the farmers he knows are just scraping by.
“It is not uncommon for folks in farming to have a year where they report a loss,” he said. “You cannot look at cattle producers that had one good year and say, ‘Oh my gosh, they are just making out like bandits.’”
Lovell blamed price increases on the large meatpacking corporations that buy product from US ranchers and package it for grocery stores.
An influx of imported beef would hurt US farmers, he said, because the large meat packers are not required to label what country their beef comes from.
There are some signs that support for Trump in farm country has begun to fray. He won 93% of rural counties in the 2024 election, the highest share of any Republican presidential candidate this century, according to the Economic Innovation Group, a bipartisan research organization.
But soybean farmers were among the first to feel the pain of Trump’s tit-for-tat tariffs with China. Since May, China has effectively boycotted American soybeans as a response to Trump’s tariffs.
Even before tariffs, the family farming industry in the United States was already hurting. Since 2017, the country has lost more than 17% of its family farms — at least 100,000 operations — according to the USDA.
Tariffs may be exacerbating that pain. Farm bankruptcies rose in the first half of the year to the highest level since 2021, according to US courts data.
John Boyd, a fourth-generation farmer and the founder of The National Black Farmers Association, said he had never had a problem selling his soybeans until recently.
“Now nobody’s buying it,” Boyd said. “The largest purchaser of our soybeans was China, and they haven’t placed any orders. Zero.”
“The president thinks his tariffs are the best thing since sliced bread, and it’s putting America’s farmers out of business,” he added.
The administration drew backlash last month after agreeing to provide $20 billion in currency support to help stabilize the Argentine peso, a move critics have characterized as effectively bailing out Argentina.
A text message, seen by CNN, sent by Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, suggested that Argentina then used that financial lifeline to strike a deal with China on soybeans.
“We bailed out Argentina yesterday and in return the Argentine’s (sic) removed their export tariffs on grains, reducing their price to China at a time when we would normally be selling to China,” the message said.
“Here we are losing our farms, and the president is helping out a foreign country,” Boyd said of the deal.
Earlier this month, sources told CNN the White House was planning to extend a multibillion-dollar bailout for farmers. With the government shutdown stretching past its third week, no plan has materialized yet.
Although the USDA has been largely shuttered during the government shutdown, the agency on Wednesday announced a plan it said would “strengthen the American beef industry.”
The plan includes expanding ranchers’ access to federal land for grazing and prioritizing grant applications from military veterans looking to enter the industry, among other measures.
Lovell said that while the plan may be welcome news to many farmers, he felt it didn’t go far enough to protect the industry.
“What US ranchers need is a fair market with the right incentives. We’ve got to encourage rebuilding the cow herd here in the US,” he said. “This seems to be a quick attempt to control the damage.”
Source link