Residents in Door County created a grassroots network of composting sites across the peninsula, such that people don’t have to drive more than a few miles to drop their food scraps.
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Brooke Rollins believes she is waging a new American Revolution, leading a crusade against Biblical darkness and guiding U.S. agriculture into a “golden age.”
In her first six months as the nation’s top agriculture official, Rollins has reshaped the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s focus — “more farmer, less climate,” she summarized. Her leadership will make farmers more prosperous than ever before, she proclaimed.
“This is making America and American agriculture great again,” she told Congress.
But her management has left many within USDA unmoored and frightened. Mass firings have purged scientists, whose discoveries underpin modern agriculture, from seeds to soil management. Indiscriminate terminations will likely deter younger, qualified candidates from joining the effort to address agriculture’s pressing challenges, such as adapting to climate change and containing animal diseases like bird flu.
Rollins-approved funding freezes and cancellations have squeezed small farmers and risked their trust. Rural communities could be kneecapped: Rollins has proposed cutting resources for broadband initiatives and Rural Development, the agency that invests in farmers’ communities.
The divestment of staff, science and sustainability programs at USDA isn’t just a budget cut; it could be a direct threat to the nation’s food system. Experts warn of far-reaching consequences: unsafe food for consumers, more invasive and economically damaging pests for farmers, and an agriculture industry forced to adapt to climate change with less scientific insight.
“We might see more farming in the dark, essentially,” said Michal Happ, a climate change and rural community expert at the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy.
Investigate Midwest spoke with multiple agricultural experts and more than 30 current and former USDA employees to better understand Rollins’ leadership style, her impact on the department and the profound consequences her administration will have for farmers, rural families and consumers.
What emerged was a picture of a leader who has brought sweeping changes and largely embraced President Trump’s agenda of downsizing the federal government. However, Rollins has also been tasked with managing Trump policies that she has privately rebuked and cuts made before she assumed office.
Trump tapped Rollins to head the massive federal department at a crucial time for American agriculture. Farmers are grappling with changing weather patterns, shifting trade policies, and even internal administration critiques of pesticide use — a report from Health Secretary Robert Kennedy Jr.’s “Make America Healthy Again” commission, which Rollins applauded, slammed farms’ pesticide reliance.
Trump has praised Rollins’ performance. In mid-April, as an aside during a press conference, Trump thanked her for lowering egg prices. “Brooke Rollins, secretary of agriculture, did a great job,” he said. During his first term, she maneuvered into his inner circle and, as Politico reported, has quickly become “one of the most powerful conservatives in the country.”
Rollins has said her mission is to be the voice of farmers in Trump’s cabinet. She appears to have pull with the president, but questions remain about her influence over decisions affecting the USDA and its staff.
Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, appeared to wield significant control over department operations, at least until recently. It influenced everything from policy language to which USDA offices remain open, according to court records and Rollins’ hearing testimony.
In a statement to Investigate Midwest, the USDA rejected any characterization that Rollins was not solely responsible for department actions.
“The claims you cite are absurd and without merit,” it said. “Secretary Rollins was appointed by President Trump to lead the Department and to insinuate that anyone other than the Constitutionally directed cabinet officer is making the decisions at USDA is unwarranted.”
She’s also been sandwiched between Trump’s signature policy, an extreme stance on immigration, and the reality of agriculture’s labor force.
“We might see more farming in the dark, essentially.”
Michal Happ, a climate change and rural community expert at the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy
Because of immigration raids, some farms’ labor pools have been depleted, and, already, some fields have not been harvested. Farmers have pleaded for relief. In early June, Rollins pushed Trump to pause enforcement on farms, The New York Times reported. After the news broke, Rollins proclaimed she was in lockstep with Trump.
Raids on farms resumed days later, but Trump recently expressed support for giving farmers discretion over undocumented workers.
“Brooke Rollins brought it up, and she said, ‘So, we have a little problem. The farmers are losing a lot of people,’ and we figured it out, and we have some great stuff being written,” he said during a July 4 speech.
On July 8, Rollins said undocumented farmworkers would receive “no amnesty.”
Farming is inherently risky. Making a living depends on good weather and profitable markets. Farmers try to limit variables, but Rollins’ first months have added disorder into the food system, said Mike Lavender, a policy expert for the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition.
“All of it is this theme of creating needless uncertainty and confusion amongst people who are trying to do the exact opposite in order to be successful in their livelihoods, support their families and ultimately support their communities,” he said.
The USDA did not directly answer questions about Rollins’ tenure, and, in a statement, it said she was cleaning up a mess left by her predecessor, Tom Vilsack.
“Secretary Rollins is working to reorient USDA to put Farmers First and be more effective and efficient at serving the American people,” the department said. “President Biden and Secretary Vilsack left USDA in complete disarray, including hiring thousands of employees with no sustainable way to pay them.”
In congressional hearings, Rollins said the USDA, which has lost more than 15,000 employees, has enough staff to fulfill its mission. Trump’s desire to make new deals with trading partners — which is causing confusion and financial anxiety for farmers — will create stability for agricultural producers, Rollins has said.
“I do believe, with every fiber of my being, that this era of unlimited or unprecedented prosperity for the ag community is just around the corner,” Rollins told Congress in June. “I’m just really, really sure of that.”
Rollins has painted the present as being “strikingly similar” to the time of the American Revolution, a period she often invokes in speeches. She has also cast her leadership in Biblical terms, citing Romans 13:12, saying she wears an “armor of light” in her current position.
“There is just a lot of darkness — not with this White House or my current boss, President Trump, or our cabinet, but the government in general,” Rollins told Decision Magazine, a religious publication, during an interview last month.
The USDA did not answer when asked if Rollins views rank-and-file employees as part of the “darkness.” But her management of employees varies drastically from her two predecessors, Vilsack and Sonny Perdue, Trump’s first agriculture secretary.
Perdue was a veterinarian and, as governor of Georgia, had led a large bureaucracy, experience that translated into running a complex federal department in a “thoughtful, analytical way,” said Kevin Shea, a USDA employee for 45 years under Republican and Democrat administrations.
“The first Trump administration at USDA was run very professionally,” Shea said. Now, however, “the USDA political leadership seems to be particularly scornful of its career workforce.”
For instance, very little information filters down to employees. Leadership has not effectively communicated what it wants, so it’s been a “gradual process of learning what is and is not OK,” said Ethan Roberts, president of AFGE Local 3247, a union representing government employees, and a nine-year USDA employee.
Agency staff used to plan months or years ahead, but that’s difficult now because they don’t know if they’ll still have jobs or if the office will exist, said one current employee who requested anonymity for fear of reprisal.
Her two predecessors regularly sent department-wide emails that communicated their goals and priorities, current and former employees said. Rollins seems to have a different audience in mind.
“She just posts on X what she’s doing,” said Laura Dodson, the vice president of AFGE Local 3403 and a longtime USDA employee. X, the social media company owned by Musk, requires an account to view posts. “It just seems everything’s coming from DOGE and whatever the White House is saying about federal employees.”
The first Trump administration also instituted funding freezes and reduced staff, including relocating USDA offices out of Washington, D.C. One of the affected agencies was the Economic Research Service, which provides insights into markets the industry relies on.
In 2019, Dodson and her colleagues were called into a conference room. If their job description was called, they would remain where they had established their lives. The others, the vast majority, would be relocated to Kansas City, Missouri. Employees started crying.
Despite that episode from Trump’s first term, Dodson said, the tone of his second stint is markedly different as DOGE, overseen by Musk until May, has wantonly carved up federal agencies.
“They still maintained a veneer of respectability. They were trying to do this for the greater good,” she said about the USDA under Perdue. “Now, with people like Elon Musk, it’s clear this is not the pursuit of efficiency. It’s the pursuit of cruelty.”
Before Rollins was sworn in, DOGE and USDA’s new political appointees began slashing.
Budget officers received a flowchart instructing them to block any money from the Inflation Reduction Act or the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, two major economic infusions during the Biden presidency, The New York Times reported. Judges have ruled the freezes illegal.
Officials, including new chief of staff Kailee Buller, submitted plans for mass firings to Musk’s quasi-governmental organization, court records show. DOGE thought it needed reworking. Then, on Feb. 13, Buller met with Noah Peters, a DOGE operative in the White House. Buller “shared her experiences terminating the employees ‘cause that process was underway at Agriculture,” Peters said.
Rollins took over that night, and, the next day, thousands received termination notices. When Congress pressed her on the mass firings, Rollins shifted responsibility. “That happened before I was sworn in,” she said.
While job cuts and funding freezes were pursued, there appeared to be little knowledge of the USDA’s work.
For instance, school nutrition researchers were told to flag any studies that included the word “class” — an attempt to discover funding for diversity, equity and inclusion, a Trump target, said one employee who asked for anonymity for fear of reprisal.
Another time, DOGE’s main liaison to the USDA, Gavin Kliger, requested that the word “tracking” be added to the list of words to flag in grants that could be terminated, according to an email included in a lawsuit.
“Tracking the exact carbon output of soybean yields does not provide a direct benefit to farmers,” he reasoned in an email to staff, “and we can reallocate that funding in a way that more directly benefits farmers.”
Kliger’s LinkedIn resume does not show any experience in agriculture. He graduated from the University of California-Berkeley in 2020 and has worked exclusively for tech and artificial intelligence companies. He has helped slash staff and funding at other agencies, including the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
It’s unclear how he came to this understanding about carbon tracking.
Carbon is essential to soil health, producing higher yields. Knowing how much carbon is escaping their soil can help farmers adopt better soil management techniques. This not only helps farmers grow more efficiently but helps keep the plant from warming. Soy industry groups have expressed the importance of tracking carbon footprints.
Also, under a Biden-era rule, measuring carbon output helps put money directly in farmers’ pockets — they can sell their output on carbon offset markets.
Despite this misguided reasoning, Kliger appears to have had considerable influence at the USDA.
In the same email, he said he wanted to surpass DOGE’s goal of cutting $120 million in climate-focused grants by a certain date. “I spoke with the Secretary tonight who was supportive of these initiatives – working on getting a memo formalized for her signature in parallel,” he wrote.
Kliger did not respond to requests for comment to his USDA email address. The USDA did not respond when asked about the email or how much influence Kliger had.
“All decisions made at the USDA are at the direction of secretary Rollins to best fulfil (sic) president trumps (sic) agenda,” the department said.
Kliger appears to have moved on. The USDA said his access to the National Finance Center, which manages employee payroll, has been “deactivated due to lack of use. … We would refer you to” the Small Business Administration.
While voices with no agricultural experience have been elevated, those with expertise — USDA employees — have been pushed aside and silenced, current and former employees said.
One skirmish between DOGE and the USDA’s rank-and-file has involved the Trump administration’s return-to-office policies. Some Republican leaders and Musk have claimed that allowing employees to work remotely is a waste.
In 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic forced remote work for staffers at the Farm Service Agency, which helps farmers access federal funding. As the year progressed, Perdue, the agriculture secretary at the time, considered calling workers back to the office.
However, an internal study found that employees had actually been more efficient, said Charles Dodson, a 30-year FSA veteran who retired late last year.
Despite that, Trump ordered remote workers back to offices when he retook the presidency. At the same time, DOGE began canceling leases of local offices around the country.
At a May hearing, members of Congress accused Rollins of being unaware that local FSA offices were being closed. Rollins did not deny the accusation. Then at a June hearing, she said the General Services Administration, a DOGE target, was behind the closures. (Some offices have since reopened.)
On the ground, the situation has caused confusion and consternation for USDA employees.
When one employee reported to a new office, they were told they weren’t on the list of transfers. How could they follow the order to report to an office if they weren’t allowed in? Another USDA employee, a researcher, was ordered to report to a Forest Service trailer in the woods. And another employee, according to NPR, was told to report to a shed where a boat was stored.
The USDA has also intimidated its workforce, current and former employees said.
According to Roberts, the department veteran and union representative, USDA scientists have been instructed to deflect questions from university researchers — their frequent collaborators — about the agency’s internal affairs.
“They’re being told to say those things for fear it looks like the USDA is silencing them,” he said, “which they are.”
Surveillance also has increased. While the government has used software to monitor employee emails for years, the Trump administration has altered it to detect emails sent to a personal or college account. As part of a leak investigation, one staffer was placed on administrative leave after emailing their personal account, even though it did not contain the leaked material officials were looking for.
The USDA did not respond to a question about the leak investigation.
Some employees have responded by doing only what is asked of them, not going above and beyond. Dodson, the retiree, recounted what a current staffer told him: “I’m afraid to do anything else. I just want to survive and not get fired.”
In May, after thousands had been forced to leave the USDA, Rollins reassured Congress the department had adequate staffing to perform its mission. For instance, she said, no one from the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, or APHIS — which includes veterinarians and staff battling invasive diseases and pests — had left.
They were “key, critical components,” she said.
The comment shocked APHIS employees. Two weeks earlier, several hundred employees who helped keep pests out of the U.S. accepted the administration’s deferred resignation offers, which would pay them to not work for months. (Some returned after the offers were rescinded.)
Overall, roughly 15% of APHIS’s 8,000 employees have departed following the administration’s attempts to cut headcount, according to DTN. That includes about 400 from the agency’s Plant Protection and Quarantine division, which keeps invasive species out of the U.S., and about 350 veterinarians, said Shea, the longtime USDA employee who was the agency’s leader under Presidents Obama, Trump and Biden.
The cuts will have a ripple effect, particularly during emergencies, he said. To respond, employees will be moved from their regular duties, leaving others to pick up the slack.
The lack of staff is a major obstacle, Shea said.
“There couldn’t be a worse time to lower our guard,” he said. “APHIS cannot do its job with that level of personnel. It simply cannot do it. I’ve never been more concerned about the agency’s ability to carry out its mission going forward.”
The USDA has implemented a hiring freeze, but in April it exempted APHIS. The agency has posted job listings online.
“Secretary Rollins will not compromise the critical work of the Department,” the USDA said. The exempted positions “carry out functions that are critical to the safety and security of the American people, our national forests, the inspection and safety of the Nation’s agriculture and food supply system.”
Another challenge Rollins has faced is trade, the lifeblood of U.S. agriculture.
When Trump returned to office, he generated chaos in the agricultural markets by starting a trade war and implementing higher tariffs. In response, Rollins has embarked on a global tour to establish new trade partners.
She has announced a few “Make Agriculture Great Again trade wins.” She recently proclaimed that Namibia, an African country, agreed to accept frozen poultry from the U.S. The Biden administration had opened the market after allaying the country’s concerns about bird flu. Also, she declared Costa Rica accepting U.S. dairy a win for Trump. An industry trade group said the “win has been several years in the making.”
Rollins has said repeatedly that the agricultural trade deficit — the U.S. imports more products from overseas than it exports — is bad for the country. The tariffs were intended to address the deficit, but the narrative hit a snag in early June.
Politico reported the USDA had delayed a regularly scheduled report because it showed Trump’s tariffs could exacerbate the trade deficit. Days later, Rollins defended the delay. “I want to be sure every piece of research we move out is the best, the best-cited, etc.,” she told Congress. (The hearing was about a week after news broke that the MAHA report, which Rollins supported, cited nonexistent studies.)
Perhaps the most pressing issue facing Rollins is helping the agriculture industry as it grapples with climate change, which is altering how farmers grow food and commodities. Rollins, however, has denied the planet is warming.
Her husband is an executive at an oil and gas company, and in a 2018 speech, she said “research of CO2 being a pollutant is just not valid,” according to Inside Climate News. More recently, she led the America First Policy Institute, which pushes Trump’s agenda. She employed another Trump loyalist, Carla Sands, who once said the idea of climate change is “Marxism to control humanity,” according to Politico.
In January, before Rollins was sworn in, USDA employees were directed to “unpublish any landing pages (on the USDA’s website) focused on climate change,” according to court records. Research involving climate change has also been effectively banned, current employees said. If studies include words such as “climate,” “clean energy,” “sustainable construction” or dozens of others, the research will not be funded.
Climate change is having profound effects on agriculture. For instance, the Corn Belt — considered the prime region for growing the valuable commodity used in everything from soft drinks to gasoline — is inching northward. In decades, instead of Iowa and Illinois, Minnesota and the Dakotas could be America’s breadbasket, researchers have predicted.
More recent research shows that, as the world keeps warming and farming gets harder, U.S. corn production could fall by 40% by century’s end.
If the USDA ignores climate issues, farmers could be struggling alone, said Happ, of the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy.
“They want to adapt to what’s going on,” he said. “They want to still have their land there and steward it for the next generation or two. Without those resources, they’re going to just have to figure it out on their own.”
The USDA did not respond when asked about Rollins’ household’s financial stake in fossil fuels. At a congressional hearing, Rollins agreed with a representative who said sound policy follows sound science. The USDA did not respond when asked why the USDA was not following climate change science.
In March, Rollins cancelled more than $1 billion in funding that paid small farmers to supply fresh meat and produce to schools and food banks. Supporters of the initiatives — named the Local Food for Schools and Child Care and Local Food Purchasing Assistance programs — said they helped local economies and supplied nutritious meals to growing kids.
In a Fox News appearance, Rollins argued the funding was non-essential because it was a COVID-era program. The funding has helped farmers in most states, according to the USDA’s website.
Nullifying those programs undercut another initiative of the Trump administration, the MAHA push to castigate processed foods and promote healthy products, said Debbie Friedman, with the Food Insight Group, which studies food system infrastructure. At the press conference releasing the MAHA report, Rollins referred to herself as a “MAHA mom.”
“While the MAHA concept is terrific,” said Friedman, specifically referencing its stance on improving the food supply, “the action steps they’re taking are the exact opposite. It’s all talk.”
Rollins has also overseen a divestment in food safety research.
The USDA has forced out 98 of 167 food safety scientists at the Agricultural Research Service, a department arm that studies how to prevent deadly pathogens, such as E. coli or Salmonella, from entering the food supply.
Foodborne illnesses could become more prevalent because the work the scientists were doing will likely just end, said Roberts, the union representative who works for the Agricultural Research Service.
“Who knows what we’ve lost? What discoveries or products that were going to be invented that we’ll just never see?” Roberts said. “We’ll be stuck with the tools we have now.”
A robust food safety system, with research and vigilant monitoring, is necessary to help prevent foodborne illnesses, which not only can hospitalize consumers but also have long-lasting health consequences, said Barbara Kowalcyk, a longtime food safety researcher who is now at George Washington University. In a 2013 study, Kowalcyk and her colleagues showed foodborne infections could lead to, among other conditions, chronic kidney disease, arthritis and cognitive deficits.
An example of science and government oversight working in concert to save lives stems from a deadly outbreak in the 1990s, she said. After eating undercooked hamburgers at Jack in the Box, more than 700 people fell ill and four children died.
The scandal put the USDA’s food safety system under an intense microscope, and the department changed how it protected America’s meat supply. Instead of eyeing and smelling a carcass, the USDA began testing for pathogens, a monumental task to implement.
The original testing procedure was first developed in the 1960s and refined over the decades. Since the USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service began using the system — named Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point — cases of foodborne illness from beef have declined dramatically.
“Lots of effort went into that,” Kowalcyk said. “We don’t see the same level of outbreaks in ground beef that we used to.”
Rollins plans on altering the USDA’s, and the country’s, future through her actions. Cutting funding to farmers, axing scientists, instilling fear in remaining employees — it’s about changing the country’s course.
“It isn’t just about the next four years,” she told Breitbart in May. “It’s about the next 250 years.”
But it could all backfire on farmers, rural communities and consumers, said Lavender, with the national sustainable agriculture coalition.
“The draining of expertise at USDA,” he said, “whether that’s scientific expertise or just expertise of people who have been there for a period of time and have built up knowledge — it will ultimately come home to roost.”
This article first appeared on Investigate Midwest and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. To republish, go to the original and consult the Investigate Midwest republishing guidelines.
A few years ago, Holly Jones started studying the micro-climate and the topography on her family farm in Crawfordsville, Iowa, about 40 miles south of Iowa City. Jones said learning more about the landscape of her fifth generation flower farm helped her recognize some of the ways weather and climate change could affect her operation.
“There are some areas of our land that are a little higher than others,” Jones said. “That’s going to impact, for example, when we’re looking out for frost advisories or frost concerns really early in the season or the end.”
Around this time, the U.S. Department of Agriculture updated its plant hardiness zones map, which divides the United States into 13 zones based on average annual minimum temperatures in a given time period.
Todd Einhorn, an associate professor in the Department of Horticulture at Michigan State University, said simply put plant hardiness zones help gardeners and farmers determine which plants are most likely to survive winters in a specific location.
Jones’ farm, called Evergreen Hill, is currently in zone 5b. The USDA found that for her area the temperature had increased by 1 degree Fahrenheit between 2012 and 2023 – a trend experts say will continue in the Upper Midwest.
In response to the changing climate and her deeper understanding of her land, Jones created “crossover plans” for the farm, planting flower varieties with overlapping bloom times. If one species is late to flower or runs its course early, she has other plants that can fill in as the farm’s “focal flower” at any given time.
Jones works to be transparent with customers about whether they can have certain flowers by a specific date when she takes orders.
She said she and her team have learned that they must be flexible when it comes to farming in a changing climate since she does not have control over growing conditions.
“We can prepare as much as we want, but there’s so much variability now in growing, especially in the ways that we grow that you just have to be prepared to pivot and adapt,” Jones said.
Jones won’t be the only one adapting.
Plant hardiness zones are shifting northward nationwide as the country continues to warm, affecting farmers, gardeners and producers across the country. The biggest changes in the coming decades are predicted to be in the Upper Midwest. The Midwest produces 27% of the nation’s agricultural goods.
The USDA Plant Hardiness Zone map has 13 zones, which serve as guidelines for growers on what kind of plants will grow well in their area.
“Hardiness zones are meant to at least delineate which species or cultivars of species could be planted based on their survival,” said Einhorn, who specializes in plant hardiness science, particularly with fruit tree species.
Each zone covers about 10 degrees — for example, Iowa lies primarily in zone 5, which means its coldest temperatures range from -20 degrees to -10 degrees Fahrenheit on average. Each zone is further divided into 5 degree half zones — the northern half of Iowa is in 5a, the southern half in 5b.
Madelynn Wuestenberg, an agricultural climatology extension specialist with Iowa State University, said that plant hardiness zones are defined by their average coldest temperatures. The averages are calculated over 30 years.
In 2023, using new averages, the USDA updated the map, moving about half of the country up by half a plant zone, meaning average minimum temperatures rose by zero to 5 degrees in the affected places.
Climate Central, a nonprofit researching climate change and how it affects people, analyzed 243 locations around the United States and found that about 67% of the locations studied based on National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration data have already shifted to warmer planting zones from the mid-1900s to present.
The researchers found that the Northwest and the Southwest, along with Alaska, have been the most affected to date.
With unabated climate change about 90% of locations examined will likely shift to warmer planting zones by the middle of this century. The Upper Midwest is predicted to be affected most.
Wuestenberg said winter temperatures in the Midwest are becoming warmer on average, compared to decades past.
“What we saw from the 1981 to 2010 climatology versus the 1991 to 2020 climatology is we’re really starting to see warming across the U.S.,” Wuestenberg said. “And this has been observed for a long time, and really it’s a pretty consistent overall warming, but the specific amount of warming varies region to region across the U.S.”
Of the cities with the highest predicted temperature change between now and mid-century, a majority of the top 25 are in the Mississippi River Basin.
Madison, Wisconsin, for example, is projected to switch from zone 5b to 6a as the average coldest temperature is expected to increase by 8.4 degrees Fahrenheit.
Jefferson City, Missouri, will likely change from zone 6b to zone 7b as the area’s average cold temperatures are projected to increase by 8.3 degrees Fahrenheit.
In Dubuque, Iowa, the average coldest temperatures are expected to rise by 8.3 degrees Fahrenheit, and producers will go from zone 5a to 6a.
Average cold temperatures in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, are on course to warm by 8.2 degrees Fahrenheit, and the region is expected to jump an entire planting zone to 6a.
The shift in plant hardiness zones could force some growers across the country to select plants that are adapted to a wider and warmer range of temperatures to survive warmer winters and earlier frosts and thaws.
In some cases, that could mean new opportunities.
Dean Colony runs Colony Acres Family Farm in North Liberty, Iowa. On his 200-acre farm, he grows pumpkins, corn, soybeans and zinnias.
His farm is currently in plant hardiness zone five, but Colony said it could be a matter of time before Iowa is able to produce peaches like Missouri and Kentucky can.
“How many more years is it going to be? I mean, we could grow peaches in Iowa, but it seems like they grow them way better down there,” Colony said. “So is it a matter of time before that comes here?”
Wuestenberg said one challenge with the shifting zones is that they are based on climatological averages and do not take atypical and significant frost or freeze events into account, which can be challenging for producers.
Wuestenberg said gardeners and fruit tree producers will likely be more concerned about the shifting zones, rather than row crop producers.
Fruit trees and vines need a certain number of chilling hours, which is the minimum period of cold weather a fruit tree needs to blossom.
For example, Einhorn said most apple trees require about a thousand chilling hours in the winter to break their dormancy period and bloom in the spring.
But with winters warming, even by a few degrees, apple trees will want to break dormancy earlier.
“Instead of being at 30 degrees Fahrenheit in the winter, maybe now the days are at 34 (degrees Fahrenheit) and that little bit of warming actually has a humongous effect on a tree,” Einhorn said.
The apple trees could start flowering in late February or early March.
“Unfortunately, what can happen is overall, winter may have been warmer, but we still might get a March, April frost. And once that happens, those buds, those flowers, are exposed to that cold temperature, and then it kills them,” Wuestenberg said.
This could lead to reduced fruit yields later in the season.
But Einhorn said there are ways that producers can work within the unpredictable conditions.
For example, there are various methods for raising temperatures for trees during a freeze, including using fans to pull warm air out of the atmosphere and running water over plants. There are also research efforts underway breeding new plants that have either delayed blooms or can withstand the new conditions.
Meanwhile, farmers will continue to adapt. Jones, the flower farmer, has noticed strong winds and storms coming through the eastern Iowa region. She’s planted sunflowers in windier areas of the farm because they can withstand stronger gusts. More delicate flowers go near trees for natural protection. She also uses netting to help stabilize flowers from winds, rains and storms.
“At the end of the season, we’re at the mercy of our climate and the weather,” Jones said. “And that can greatly impact what we have in any given season.”
This story is a product of the Mississippi River Basin Ag & Water Desk, an independent reporting network based at the University of Missouri in partnership with Report for America, with major funding from the Walton Family Foundation.
Wisconsin Watch is a member of the Ag & Water Desk network. Sign up for our newsletters to get our news straight to your inbox.
A warming climate is changing growing conditions, shifting planting zones northward is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.
The Local Food Purchase Assistance program, or LFPA, was a federal program that awarded states two-year grants to help small farmers invest in their local food systems while growing their businesses.
The Trump administration gutted the program in March, just as farmers started placing seed orders. The timing particularly affected livestock farmers who often need to commit to the size of their herd and harvest over a year in advance.
Wisconsin Watch staff writer Bennet Goldstein spent weeks talking with producers affected by the loss of LFPA, including Jess D’Souza, a pork farmer in Dane County. During one of several visits to her farm, he and photojournalist Patricio Crooker watched meat processors harvest her pigs to fully appreciate how food travels from farm to plate.
On a separate visit to the farm, Joe Timmerman photographed Jess and her herd of Gloucestershire Old Spots pigs, documenting many beautiful moments on the piece of agricultural land that she purchased nearly a decade ago and eventually named Wonderfarm.
Collectively, the images tell a story of life, death and resilience on a small farm – but some viewers may find some of the images in the video uncomfortable or even emotionally upsetting. Our decision to include them was the result of many discussions that touch on long-standing debates in newsrooms about when it is justified to publish or showcase disquieting images related to death, injury or violence.
Some of the questions raised in these discussions don’t have simple answers. For instance, Bennet wonders whether our desire to outsource meat production to others — and hide the bloody parts of that business — contributes to the characterization of these photos as being in poor taste or emotionally disturbing.
We welcome your thoughts and feedback on any of the issues and questions raised in this reporting.
As for the LFPA program’s future, Wisconsin producers hope to see funding restored in the yet-to-be-debated federal Farm Bill.
Wisconsin Watch is a nonprofit, nonpartisan newsroom. Subscribe to our newsletters for original stories and our Friday news roundup.
Video: life, death and resilience at Wonderfarm is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.
Two piglets jostled in the barnyard as Jess D’Souza stepped outside. Neither youngster seemed to be winning their morning game of tug-of-war over an empty feed bag.
Jess approached the chicken coop. She swung open the weathered door. The flood of fowl scampered up a hill to a cluster of empty food bowls.
Groans resembling bassoons and didgeridoos leaked from the hog house as groggy pigs stirred. Jess often greets them in a singsong as she completes chores.
Hi Mama! Hi babies!
She asks if she can get them some hay. Or perhaps something to drink? The swine respond with raspy snorts and spine-rattling squeals.
Jess unfurled the hose from the water pump as pigs trudged outdoors into their muddy pen.
“Is everybody thirsty? Are you all thirsty? Is that what’s going on?”
That morning, Jess slipped a Wisconsin Farmers Union beanie over her dark brown hair and stepped into comfy gray Dovetail overalls — “Workwear for Women by Women.” The spring wind was still crisp. Bare tree branches swayed across the 80-acre farm.
She filled a plastic bucket, then heaved the water over a board fence into a trough.
Growing up, the Chicago native never imagined a career rearing dozens of Gloucestershire Old Spots pigs in Klevenville, Wisconsin — an agricultural enclave surrounded by creeping neighborhoods of the state’s capital and surrounding communities.
She can watch the precociously curious creatures from her bedroom window much of the year. Their skin is pale, dotted with splotchy ink stains. Floppy ears shade their eyes from the sun like an old-time bank teller’s visor.
Jess spends her days tending to the swine, hoisting 40-pound organic feed bags across her shoulder and under an arm. Some pigs lumber after her, seeking scratches, belly rubs and lunch. Juveniles dart through gaps in the electric netting she uses to cordon off the barnyard, woods and pastures up a nearby hill.
She knows she shouldn’t view her pigs like pet dogs, but she coos at them when she works. Right until the last minute.
Jess hadn’t anticipated politics would so dramatically affect her farm.
Last year, Jess doubled the size of her pig herd, believing the government’s agriculture department, the USDA, would honor a $5.5 million grant it awarded to Wisconsin.
Under the Biden administration, the agency gave states money for two years to run the Local Food Purchase Assistance program, or LFPA, which helped underserved farmers invest in local food systems and grow their businesses.
In Wisconsin, the state, Indigenous tribes and several farming groups developed a host of projects that enabled producers to deliver goods like plump tomatoes and crisp emerald spinach to food pantries, schools and community organizations across all 72 counties.
The Trump administration gutted the program in March, just as farmers started placing seed orders. For her part, Jess must anticipate the size of her pork harvests 18 months in advance. She banked on program funding as guaranteed income.
This was supposed to be the year Jess, 40, broke a profit after a decade of toiling. She has never paid herself.
Jess chuckles as she admits she worries too much. She’s an optimist at heart but mulls over questions that lack ready-made answers: How will she support herself following her recent divorce? How are her son and daughter faring during their tumultuous teens? How will she keep the piglets from being squished by the adults?
Now, if she can’t find buyers for the four tons of pork she expects to produce, will she even be able to keep farming?
The world, she thinks, feels like it’s on fire.
***
In childhood, Jess, the elder sibling, strove to meet her parents’ expectations. School was her top priority. Academic achievement would lead to a good job, material comfort and happiness. She realized only as an adult that her rejection of this progression reflected a difference in values, not a personal deficiency.
She almost taught high school mathematics after college, but didn’t like forcing lukewarm students to learn.
Jess moved in 2005 to Verona, Wisconsin, where she planted fruit trees and vegetable gardens in her suburban yards. But a yard can only produce so much. She wanted chickens and ducks and perennial produce.
Jess can’t pinpoint a precise moment when she decided to farm pigs.
She attended workshops where farmers raved about Gloucestershires. The mamas attentively care for their offspring. Jess wouldn’t have to fret that the docile creatures would eat her own kids. Pigs also are the source of her favorite meats, and the breed tastes delicious. Her housemate wanted to harvest one.
It took almost 3 ½ years to name the farm after Jess and her then-husband located and purchased the property in 2016.
She hiked it during a showing and discovered a creek and giant pile of sand in the woods that for her children could become the best sandbox ever.
What did the place encapsulate, she mused.
She chronicled life on “Yet to be Named Community Farm” across social media: Photographs of piglets wrestling in straw piles next to lip-smacking pork entrees.
Also, lessons learned.
“I like to tell people I’m a recovering perfectionist, and farming is playing a large part in that recovery,” Jess posted to Facebook. She can’t develop the perfect plan in the face of unpredictability. Farmers must embrace risk. Maybe predators will infiltrate the hen house, the ends of a fence don’t quite align or a mama will crush her litter.
On the farm, life and death meet.
Some days, Jess can only keep the dust out of her eyes and her wounds bandaged.
Years later, the creatures living on the land still insist she take a moment to pause.
Jess once encountered a transparent monarch chrysalis. She inspected the incubating butterfly’s wings, noticing each tiny gold dot.
The farm instills a sense of wonderment.
When the idea for a name emerged, she knew.
Wonderfarm.
***
In March, a thunderstorm crashed overhead, and Jess couldn’t sleep. Clicking through her inbox at 5 a.m., she had more than five times her usual emails to sift through.
The daily stream of news from Washington grew unbearable. Murmurings that LFPA might be cancelled had been building.
President Donald Trump’s administration wasted no time throttling the civil service since he took office in January. Billionaire Elon Musk headed a newly created Department of Government Efficiency that scoured offices and grants purportedly seeking to unearth waste and fraud.
The executive branch froze payments, dissolved contracts and shuttered programs. Supporters cheered a Republican president who promised to finally drain the swamp. Detractors saw democracy and the rule of law cracking under hammer blows.
But agriculture generally gleans support from both sides of the aisle, Jess thought. Although lawmakers disagree over who may claim to be a “real” farmer versus a mere hobbyist, surely the feds wouldn’t can the program.
Like the lightning overhead, the news shocked.
LFPA “no longer effectuates agency priorities,” government officials declared in terse letters sent to states and tribes.
Its termination left Jess and hundreds of producers and recipients in a lurch. The cut coincided with ballooning demand at food banks and pantries while congressional Republicans pushed legislation to shrink food assistance programs.
LFPA is a relic of a bygone era, Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins said in May.
She smiled as she touted the administration’s achievements and defended agency reductions before congressional appropriations subcommittees.
Sen. Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis., pressed the secretary, asking if the department will reinstate “critical” food assistance programs. One in five Wisconsin children and one in 10 adults — often elderly, disabled or employed but struggling — are unable to or uncertain how they will obtain enough nutritious food.
“Those were COVID-era programs,” Rollins said, shaking her head. “They were never meant to go forever and ever.”
But LFPA also strengthened local food infrastructure, which withered on the vine as a few giant companies — reaching from fields to grocery aisles — came to dominate America’s agricultural sector.
The pandemic illustrated what happens when the country’s food system grinds to a halt. Who knows when the next wave will strike?
***
Nearly 300 Wisconsin producers participated in LFPA over two years. A buyer told Jess their organization could purchase up to $12,000 of pork each month — almost as much as Jess previously earned in a year.
Wisconsin’s $8 million award was among the tiniest of drops in the USDA’s billion-dollar budget. The agency’s decision seemed illogically punitive.
Only a few months earlier, Biden’s agriculture department encouraged marginalized farmers and fishers to participate so underserved communities could obtain healthy and “culturally relevant” foods like okra, bok choy and Thai chilis.
Then the Trump administration cast diversity, equity and inclusion programs as “woke” poison.
Cutting LFPA also clashes with Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s Make America Healthy Again initiative and his calls to ban ultra-processed foods. Farmers and distributors wondered what goods pantries would use to stock shelves instead of fresh produce. Boxed macaroni?
The aftershocks of the canceled award spread through Wisconsin’s local food distribution networks. Trucks had been rented, staff hired and hub-and-spoke routes mapped in preparation for three more years of government-backed deliveries.
For a president who touts the art of the deal, pulling the plug on an investment that neared self-sufficiency is just bad business, said Tara Turner-Roberts, manager of the Wisconsin Food Hub Cooperative.
Democratic Gov. Tony Evers accused the Trump administration of abandoning farmers, and Attorney General Josh Kaul recently joined 20 others suing to block grant rescissions.
Meanwhile, participants asked the agriculture department and Congress to reinstate the program. Should that fail, they implored Wisconsin legislators to fill the gap and continue to seek local solutions.
Jess is too.
***
Jess alternately texted on her cellphone and scanned a swarm of protesters who gathered across the Wisconsin State Capitol’s lawn.
She had agreed to speak before hundreds, potentially thousands, of people and was searching for an organizer.
Madison’s “Hands off!” rally reflected national unrest that ignited during the first 75 days of Trump’s term. In early April, a coalition of advocates and civil rights groups organized more than 1,300 events across every state.
Jess pulled out a USDA-branded reusable sandwich bag, which she had loaded with boiled potatoes to snack on. She and her new girlfriend joined the masses and advanced down State Street to the University of Wisconsin-Madison campus.
A hoarse woman wearing a T-shirt covered in peace patches and a tie-dye bandana directed the marchers. She led them in a menagerie of greatest protest hits during the 30-minute walk past shops, restaurants and mixed-use high-rises.
“Money for jobs and education, not for war and corporations!” her metallic voice crackled through a megaphone.
Trump’s administration had maligned so many communities, creating a coherent rallying cry seemed impossible. The chant leader hurriedly checked her cellphone for the next jingle in a dizzying display of outrage.
“The people, united, will never be defeated!”
“Say it loud! Say it clear! Immigrants are welcome here!”
Jess leaned into her girlfriend, linking arms as they walked.
They ran into a friend with violet hair. Jess grinned sheepishly, trying not to think about the speech.
“You’ll be fine,” her friend said.
The chant captain bellowed.
“Hands off everything!”
A black police cruiser flashed its emergency lights as the walk continued under overcast skies.
An hour later, Jess stood atop a cement terrace, awed by the sea of chatter, laughter and shouts that swamped the plaza.
A friend took her photo. Jess swayed to the chant of “Defund ICE!” A protester walked past, carrying a sign bearing the silhouette of Trump locking lips with Russian President Vladmir Putin.
Someone passed Jess a microphone. The crowd shouted to the heavens that “trans lives matter!” A cowbell clanged.
She grinned.
“I don’t want to slow us down,” Jess began.
She described her dilemma as the crowd listened politely. The government broke its commitments. She struggles to pay bills between unpredictable sales. Some farm chores require four working hands.
Jess only has two.
“LFPA kind of gave me hope that I’d be able to keep doing the thing that I love,” she said.
Bystanders booed as she recounted the night of the fateful email. Jess chuckled and rocked on her foot, glad to see friends in the audience.
“The structures around us are crumbling,” she said, shrugging. “So let’s stop leaning on them. Let’s stop feeding them. Let’s grow a resilient community.”
The crowd whooped.
***
It’s hard for Jess to stomach meat on harvest days.
Naming an animal and later slaughtering it necessitates learning how to grieve. Jess had years to practice.
The meat processor’s truck rumbled up the farm driveway at 7 a.m. in late April.
Jess spent the previous week sorting her herd, selecting the six largest non-breeding swine. She ushered them to either side of a fence that bisected the barnyard.
It took roughly 30 minutes for the two butchers to transform a pig into pork on Jess’ farm. The transfiguration occurred somewhere between the barnyard, the metal cutting table and the cooler where the halved carcasses dangle from hooks inside the mobile slaughter unit.
The butchers unpacked their gear in the gentle morning glow. Jess carried a plastic tray of eggs, squash shavings and mango peels to the pen.
The snack helps lure anxious pigs during the harvest. It’s also a final gift for the one they are about to give.
The butchers employed an electrical stunner that resembles a pair of barbecue tongs. A coiled cord connects the contraption to a battery that releases an electric current.
When pressed to a pig’s head, the animal seizes and passes out. The butchers cut its chest before it awakens.
An hour into the harvest, Jess guided more swine from a trailer, where a cluster slept the previous night, along with a seventh little pig that wasn’t headed to the block.
A male began to urinate atop a dead female — possibly mating behavior. Jess smacked his butt to shoo him away. She regretted it.
He bolted across the yard, grunting and sidestepping whenever Jess approached.
“Just leave him for the next round,” one of the butchers said.
Jess remembers her first on-farm slaughter years ago when a female spooked and tore through the woods. Jess kept her as a breeder.
The agitated male disappeared behind the red barn. He sniffed the air as he peeked around the corner.
The standoff lasted another hour. One of the butchers returned with a 20-gauge shotgun. He unslung it from his shoulder, then walked behind the building.
Jess turned away. She covered her ears. A rooster crowed.
The crack split the air.
The other worker hauled the pig across the barnyard, leaving a glossy wake in the dirt.
Jess crossed the pen, shoulders deflated, and stepped over the dividing fence to feed the others.
A 6-month-old trotted over to her. Jess squatted on her haunches and extended a gloved hand.
“Are you playing?” she asked. “Is that what is happening?”
***
The May harvest never happened.
Nearly all the females were pregnant, even though they aren’t designated breeders. Jess will postpone the slaughter day for now.
She needs to decide whether to raise her spring piglets or sell them. It all depends on how quickly she can move product, but she’s leaning toward keeping them.
The pork from April’s butchering is on ice as she works her way down a list of potential buyers. She still serves people in need by selling a portion to a Madison nonprofit that distributes Farms to Families “resilience boxes.”
Jess marks the days she collects her meat from the processor. She defrosts, say, a pack of brats and heats them up for dinner.
She celebrates her pigs.
Jess and her farming peers are planning for a world with less federal assistance.
One idea: They would staff shifts at the still-under-construction Madison Public Market, where fresh food would remain on site 40 hours a week. No more schlepping meat from cold storage to a pop-up vendor stand.
She dreams of a wholesale market where buyers place large orders. One day maybe. No government whims or purse strings.
Like seeds that sprout after a prairie burn, some institutions will survive the flames, she thinks. Perhaps it doesn’t have to be the ones in Washington.
Those that remain will grow anew.
This story is part of a partnership with the Mississippi River Basin Ag & Water Desk, an editorially independent reporting network based at the University of Missouri School of Journalism in partnership with Report for America and funded by the Walton Family Foundation.
Wisconsin Watch is a member of the Ag & Water Desk network. Sign up for our newsletters to get our news straight to your inbox.
Wisconsin pig farmer holds on at Wonderfarm as Washington breaks a promise is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.
For Pepper Roberts, running a successful farm comes down to managing risk and planning for potential challenges.
While other farmers sold their crops last fall, Roberts used grain bins to store half of his corn harvest, betting that he’d get a better price once corn supplies grew scarce.
In January, Roberts sold the corn at an inflated rate, which helped cover bills left over from last year. The funds also provided a financial buffer for the current growing season.
“The Good Lord blessed me,” said Roberts, who grows soybeans, cotton, corn and other grains on a 6,250-acre farm in Belzoni, Mississippi. “There’s opportunities out there for (every farm) — it doesn’t matter what size.”
Like many other farmers, Roberts is now preparing for a year of uncertainty and tight margins. Since returning to the White House, President Donald Trump has enacted sweeping tariffs on imported goods, igniting trade disputes and disrupting global markets. Farmers were already facing high input costs and falling crop prices entering 2025, and many relied on government aid to offset losses last year.
Despite these headwinds, however, Roberts steadfastly supports the tariffs.
“In the long run, it’s going to be the best thing that ever happened,” he said, predicting that the levies will pressure trade partners like China to negotiate new purchasing agreements with the U.S.
Roberts is not alone. Though there’s been plenty of backlash from the agricultural sector, Trump’s tariffs have also drawn support from a subset of farmers, who see them as a means of regaining an edge in an increasingly competitive global economy.
A May survey of 400 U.S. producers found that 70% believe the tariffs will strengthen their industry in the long term. The same poll found that just 43% of respondents think the levies will hurt their earnings this year, down from 56% a month earlier. Respondents were based around the country and ran operations that grossed above $500,000 annually, according to the survey authors.
Much of this support reflects the belief that the tariffs will lead to better trade deals for American farmers. China is a top destination for U.S. agricultural exports like soybeans, and getting it to buy a set amount of crops each year would guarantee a market for producers without the threat of competition, one economist explained. That certainty, in turn, would stabilize commodity crop prices.
A new trade deal with China “locks in a source of demand” for U.S. farm products, said Will Maples, a professor at Mississippi State University’s Department of Agricultural Economics.
That guaranteed demand is essential for the 10 states bordering the Mississippi River, where agriculture exports collectively surpassed $57 billion in 2023. Though some Mississippi farmers worried the tariffs could backfire and worsen market conditions, others said they would be willing to weather a difficult year or two for increased trade opportunities down the road.
“Coming into all of this, we were already facing a downturn in the ag economy,” Maples said. “(If) you think about … Trump’s base, most of these guys probably voted for him. So it seems like they are willing to give him (the) benefit of the doubt in the short term.”
Trump’s trade war has proven divisive for American farmers — a group that overwhelmingly backed the president during last year’s election, according to a county-level analysis by Investigate Midwest.
When the White House imposed tariffs on most foreign imports earlier this year — including a staggering 145% tax on Chinese goods — many farmers and trade groups sounded the alarm, warning that the levies would raise supply costs domestically and threaten U.S. crop sales overseas. China retaliated with its own tariffs throughout the spring, though both countries have since scaled back their steepest duties.
In May, a federal court declared many of the president’s tariffs illegal. A separate court allowed them to remain in place while the administration appeals the decision.
As of June 11, the U.S. and China have reportedly reached a tentative accord to deescalate their trade dispute without inking a significant deal. According to the New York Times, some tariffs will remain in place on both sides.
As the administration continues to adjust the size and scope of its levies, the agricultural sector has already sustained losses. China has canceled mass shipments of American farm products, and industry groups warn that a lengthy trade dispute could further reduce demand for U.S. exports.
China has been steadily developing agricultural markets in other parts of the world, primarily Brazil, explained Mike McCormick, president of the Mississippi Farm Bureau Federation.
“They’re developing a lot of farmland there, and (China is) buying a lot of their products,” McCormick said.
Of particular concern to McCormick is China’s growing reliance on Brazilian soybeans, which are used as livestock feed. Soybeans remain the United States’ largest agricultural export to China, and they’re mostly grown around the Mississippi River Basin, with Illinois, Iowa and Minnesota accounting for nearly 40% of the nation’s total production in 2022. But Brazil has dominated China’s soybean import market for more than a decade.
Should Chinese demand for soybeans increase amid a prolonged trade standoff with the U.S., experts say Brazil is uniquely positioned to fill that void.
“Brazil could convert an additional 70 million acres of pasture land into crop production without knocking down a single acre of forest,” said Joe Janzen, an agricultural economist at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. That’s over 80% of the total soybean acreage grown in the U.S. last year.
Proponents of Trump’s trade policies hope the tariffs will bring China back to the negotiating table, culminating in a trade deal similar to the one announced during the president’s first term.
In January 2020, Trump and China inked an agreement that called for China to purchase $80 billion in U.S. agricultural products through 2022. Crop prices soared in the next two years, though Maples at MSU stressed that market forces beyond the agreement — namely higher global spending in the latter stages of the pandemic — contributed to the increases.
The problem with Trump’s more expansive and erratic tariff strategy this time is that it risks alienating trade partners and further destabilizing markets, which in turn would drive down crop prices, Maples explained. Farmers base yearly planting decisions on what they can reasonably expect to earn for each crop, and the president’s on-again, off-again tariffs have made these projections significantly more tenuous.
“You can’t plan well when there’s so much uncertainty,” said Maples. “As long as we keep dealing with this, it’s going to be hard for prices to recover.”
Roberts plans on sticking to his usual crop rotation this year despite the tariff-fueled uncertainty. The rotation has “paid for itself” in past years, he said, and he’s hoping to squeeze enough profit out of this year’s cycle to balance out expenses. He also has some savings from past years to fall back on if things go south.
“You can’t hit a grand slam every year,” Roberts said. “We all want the biggest profit we can ever make, but when I cross (the) break-even point, I’m ready to lock something in.”
Other farmers are more bearish about their prospects this season. In Clarksdale, Mississippi, Cliff Heaton has struggled to keep up with ballooning production costs on his 15,000-acre farm, where he grows cotton, corn, soybeans and other grains. Consecutive years of falling crop prices on top of high input costs created a perfect storm for Heaton, who suffered record losses in 2024. “I lost more money last year than I’ve lost in my entire life put together,” he said. “And it looks like this year’s heading in the same direction.”
Heaton said he supports the goal of securing better trade deals for U.S. producers, but he worries farmers may not survive the tariffs and their financial fallout without ample government assistance. He says recent market conditions have forced some of his friends to give up farming, and he’s considering a 40% reduction in operations if conditions don’t improve by harvest time.
“Inflation is taking its toll on us in our industry, and we’re not seeing (improvements) on our sales side,” said Heaton. He says particularly for products without a significant domestic market, like cotton, “as long as we’re dependent on selling into a world market … we need help.”
On March 18, U.S. Department of Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins announced that her agency would distribute up to $10 billion in subsidies to help farmers bounce back from 2024. The funds, authorized by Congress at the end of last year, have helped Mississippi farmers reduce outstanding debts and secure crop loans for the current growing season, according to McCormick.
As Trump fights to preserve his tariffs in court, McCormick said his members may be willing to “stand a little bit of pain” if the trade dispute leads to new markets. “We just gotta hope that we can get better deals and … a quick resolution,” he said.
Maples worries that pain could prove too great for some local producers, especially those who are new to the industry and lack the capital to withstand an extended tariff onslaught. The trade dispute could fast-track retirement plans for some older farmers in the state, he added.
These farm closures would have ripple effects across entire communities, affecting people and companies that rely on their business, Maples concluded.
“A bad farm economy hurts rural America at the end of the day,” he said.
Nick Judin contributed reporting.
This story is a product of the Mississippi River Basin Ag & Water Desk, an independent reporting network based at the University of Missouri in partnership with Report for America, with major funding from the Walton Family Foundation.
Wisconsin Watch is a member of the Ag & Water Desk network. Sign up for our newsletters to get our news straight to your inbox.
Trump’s tariffs are hurting US agriculture. Some farmers support them anyway. is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.
Farm Foundation is honored to announce a generous gift from Riley Boschma in support of the Farm Family Wellness Alliance, a national initiative dedicated to providing mental health resources to farmers and their families. This meaningful contribution honors the memory of Riley’s husband, Jimmy Boschma, a respected farmer whose life was tragically impacted by the challenges of mental health.
Riley has been rooted in agriculture for generations, embodying the resilience and dedication that define the farming community. Yet, like so many in the industry, they have experienced firsthand the immense pressures that come with farming. In 2024, their beloved Jimmy lost his struggle to maintain mental health, leaving behind a grieving wife and five young children determined to turn their loss into hope for others. In response to their personal loss, Riley has committed to supporting mental health awareness and access to resources for farm families nationwide.
“Our family understands the struggles that so many in agriculture face, and we want Jimmy’s story to raise awareness and be a beacon of hope, encouraging others to seek help when they need it. Asking for help is a sign of strength, not weakness—it does not define who you are, but rather shows your courage to keep going,” said Riley Boschma. “Through this gift, we hope to ensure that farm families have access to the mental health support they need and to reduce the stigma that prevents many from seeking help.”
The Farm Family Wellness Alliance, an initiative of Farm Foundation in partnership with most major agricultural organizations in the US, including 4H, American Farmer Bureau Federation, FFA, Farmers Union, and others, provides farm families with free, confidential access to mental health support through an online peer-to-peer community, professional resources, and crisis intervention services. Since its national launch in 2024, the program has expanded to serve farmers and agricultural communities across 47 states, offering a safe space for connection and healing through TogetherAll, an online mental health support community exclusively for American farm family members aged 16 and above.
“The generosity of Riley Boschma and her children will have a lasting impact on the lives of so many in agriculture,” said Shari Rogge-Fidler, CEO of Farm Foundation. “This gift not only honors Jimmy’s legacy but also strengthens our ability to reach more farm families with critical mental health resources. We are grateful for their commitment to creating meaningful change in the industry.”
Farmers are the backbone of our nation, yet they often carry an invisible burden. As economic pressures, unpredictable weather, and the weight of legacy continue to challenge those in agriculture, access to mental health support is more vital than ever. Riley’s contribution underscores the urgent need for expanded resources in rural communities and serves as a call to action for others to invest in the well-being of those who feed the nation. Learn more about the Boschma farm at www.boschmafarms.org
The post The Gift of Hope: Dedication to Mental Health in Rural Communities appeared first on Farm Foundation.
Farm Foundation recently hosted a thought-provoking panel discussion in partnership with the Farm Robotics Challenge, offering college students a unique opportunity to gain insight into real-world agricultural challenges and how technology can play a pivotal role in addressing them. The panel brought together voices from across the agricultural value chain—farmers, innovators, and industry leaders—to discuss the future of robotics in farming and provide direct feedback to the student teams as they embark on their robotics projects.
If you would like to watch the panel discussion, you can access the full recording here.
The panel featured an incredible lineup of experts and practitioners who shared their perspectives:
Klaas Martens: Klaas is a third-generation farmer in New York. He operates Martens Farm and Lakeview Organic Grain Mill with his wife Mary Howell Martens and their son Peter. On 1,600 acres, he produces numerous crops, including corn, soybeans, spelt, wheat, einkorn, emmer, triticale, buckwheat, oats, barley, rye, cabbage, dry beans, and hay. He’s been farming since the 1970s and shifted to organic farming in the 90s. Klaas is a Farm Foundation Round Table Fellow.
David Hill: Southern Hill Farms, owned and operated by the Hill family, has deep roots in agriculture. David and Lisa Hill, along with their sons Michael and Kyle and daughter-in-law Brooke, continue a farming legacy that began with Lisa’s grandfather in Virginia and extended to Central Florida in the mid-20th century. Starting with ornamental trees in Clermont, the Hills diversified in 2010 by planting blueberries, eventually welcoming the public in 2014 for u-pick events and community gatherings. Today, Southern Hill Farms is a beloved Central Florida destination, known for its Fall Festival, farm market, and family-friendly experiences. David is also a Farm Foundation Round Table Fellow.
Kevin Seidel: Kevin Seidl is a group product manager for the John Deere Operations Center
(JDOC) at John Deere. He leads a group of product managers responsible for key features within the JDOC, with a specific focus on live remote monitoring and equipment & agronomic analysis capabilities. As a software engineer, Kevin has built some of the foundational features of the JDOC program. Throughout his 15-plus years at John Deere, he has had various product management roles of increasing responsibility, where he has focused on the JDOC’s monitoring and analysis capabilities. Kevin earned a bachelor’s degree in computer science from Bradley University and a master’s in business administration from the University of Iowa.
Moderator: Tim Brennan, VP of Programs and Strategic Impact at Farm Foundation, who guided the discussion and connected the insights to Farm Foundation’s broader mission.
1. Automation and the Labor Shortage
Farmers face ongoing labor shortages, making automation and robotics an urgent need rather than a luxury. Panelists emphasized that technology should not replace workers but rather enable farmers to address gaps in their workforce. Solutions like autonomous machinery and follow-me functionality were highlighted as transformative tools that could alleviate these challenges.
2. Harvesting Challenges and Opportunities
One of the most pressing issues discussed was the need for robotics to address harvesting challenges, particularly in specialty crops like strawberries. Unlike blueberries, which already have some mechanical solutions, strawberries require precision to pick ripe fruit without damage. Developing robotics capable of 24/7 harvesting could revolutionize the industry.
3. Smaller, Smarter Machines for Soil Health
Larger machinery has contributed to significant soil health concerns, including compaction and increased energy use. Panelists discussed the opportunity for robotics to lead the way toward smaller, lighter, and more collaborative machines. These innovations would not only protect soil but also reduce operational energy demands.
4. Practical, Farmer-Centered Solutions
A recurring theme throughout the discussion was the importance of creating practical, problem-solving technology. Farmers need innovations that work in diverse conditions, are reliable, and solve specific challenges like soil conditions or adverse weather.
Hosting this panel aligns directly with Farm Foundation’s mission: to build trust and understanding at the intersections of agriculture and society. By partnering with the Farm Robotics Challenge, Farm Foundation supports the next generation of innovators and provides a vital space for collaboration between farmers and technology developers.
This event highlighted the importance of bringing real-world agricultural perspectives to the forefront, ensuring that technology is grounded in practicality and addresses the evolving needs of those throughout the food and agriculture value chain.
As the student teams dive into their robotics projects, we look forward to seeing how their ideas take shape and how they tackle the challenges outlined during the panel. The Farm Robotics Challenge serves as a testament to the power of collaboration and innovation in shaping the future of agriculture.
We’re proud to continue fostering connections between agriculture, technology, and society, and we can’t wait to see how these students contribute to a more innovative and sustainable agricultural future.
The post Bridging Innovation and Agriculture: Insights from the Farm Robotics Challenge Panel appeared first on Farm Foundation.
Farm Foundation’s Meet Your Farmer podcast featured Steve Kaufman in season 1, episode 3.
Steve is a fifth-generation farmer. He returned to his family’s Idaho farm full time in 2014 when his uncles and father were ready to retire. He and his two brothers farm 14,000 dryland crop acres, growing primarily winter wheat, spring wheat, peas, garbanzo beans, and canola. Prior to that, he worked at Northwest Farm Credit Services while also farming part time. Steve is an alum of Farm Foundation’s Young Farmer Accelerator Program.
In this episode, Steve talks about how gratifying it is to produce enough grain for 30 million loaves of bread on his farm, the hard work of trying to balance life with young kids and farm life, and what the process was like to switch over to no-till.
Music: “Country Roads” by Sergii Pavkin from Pixabay
Reach us at communication@farmfoundation.org.
The post Farm Foundation’s Meet Your Farmer Podcast with Steve Kaufman appeared first on Farm Foundation.
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