The first Trump administration spent $28 billion bailing out farmers during a trade war with China. The White House has said it’s starting to look at how to help this time around.
Tariffs are making life more expensive for John Pihl. He’s been farming in Northern Illinois for more than 50 years.
«These tariffs are going to affect everything. It’ll affect our parts — it’s just across the board. Which is going to hurt everything», he said.
Not only do tariffs affect the cost of farm supplies, but they also raise the risk of retaliation against exports of U.S. crops: a double-whammy for farmers like Pihl.
«It’s a good way to lose your customers», he said. «And I think we’ll probably lose more on this round too, because I know that Mexico is our biggest importer of corn. But this time, they may figure out that they can get corn from South America just as easily as from the U.S.»
President Trump has imposed tariffs on countries from the world over, including 25% on steel and aluminum, 25% on some Canadian and Mexican goods, and a staggering 145% on Chinese goods. So far, the most notable retaliation has come from China, which has now imposed a 125% tariff on U.S. goods.
The White House is considering ways to help farmers. «We’re already starting to think about what a mitigation effort might look like», Secretary Brooke Rollins said on Fox News this week.
She nodded to aid that Trump’s administration gave farmers during his first-term trade dispute with China, money that came from a fund called the Commodity Credit Corporation (CCC).
