Tag: farmer

Michigan Farmers Struggle as Fertilizer Prices Jump 120 Percent

The Center Square

Spiking fertilizer prices spiking over the last two years is contributing to current rising food inflation, says Theresa Sisung, an industry relations specialist for the Michigan Farm Bureau.

Record 40-year-high inflation is biting into Michiganders’ budgets from more expensive cars, higher energy costs, and higher prices at the grocery store, and it’s no different for farmers who tend roughly 47,600 farms in the Wolverine state that house nearly 10 million acres of farmland.

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Farmers Cry Foul over Biden’s Death Tax Proposal

The Center Square
Woman with ball cap on, out in the fields of a farm

President Joe Biden has proposed amending the inheritance tax, also known as the “death tax,” but farmers around the country are raising concerns about the plan.

In the American Families Plan introduced earlier this year, Biden proposed repealing the “step-up in basis” in tax law. The stepped-up basis is a tax provision that allows an heir to report the value of an asset at the time of inheriting it, essentially not paying gains taxes on how much the assets increased in value during the lifetime of the deceased. This allows heirs to avoid gains taxes altogether if they sell the inheritance immediately.

Under Biden’s change, heirs would be forced to pay taxes on the appreciation of the assets, potentially over the entire lifetime of the recently deceased relative. 

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Tennessee Farmer Wins Injunction Against USDA in Loan Forgiveness Dispute

The Center Square
Tractor in the middle of a field during golden hour

A federal judge in Tennessee has ruled in favor of a Tennessee farmer, granting an injunction against the U.S. Department of Agriculture in its effort to grant federal loan forgiveness to only “non-whites.”

The Southeastern Legal Foundation and the Mountain States Legal Foundation joined to represent Union City farmer Robert Holman as he challenges a provision in the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) that allows for automatic loan forgiveness up to 120% of the federal loan for farmers or ranchers who are “socially disadvantaged,” which is defined as “Black, American Indian/Alaskan Native, Hispanic, or Asian, or Hawaiian/Pacific Islander.”

The legal ruling estimated while there was not a cap on the amount of loans that could be granted, $3.8 billion had been allocated to the program and, without an injunction, those funds might be gone before the case is resolved.

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Midwest Farmers Among Those Challenging Biden Administration Loan Forgiveness

The Center Square
Field with tractor in it, loaded with hay on trailer

A pair of Wisconsin farmers are part of a new lawsuit challenging President Biden’s race-based program for farm loan forgiveness.

The Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty filed the suit on behalf of Calumet County farmer Adam Faust and Crawford County farmer Christopher Baird, as well as clients in Minnesota, South Dakota, and Ohio. The suit claims the farm loan forgiveness program included in the American Rescue Plan discriminates because it is only open to farmers of color.

“President Joe Biden’s signature COVID-19 relief legislation signed in March, provides billions of dollars of debt relief to ‘socially disadvantaged’ farmers and ranchers,” WILL said in a statement about the case. “But the law’s definition of “socially disadvantaged” includes explicit racial classifications: farmers and ranchers must be Black or African American, American Indian or Alaskan native, Hispanic or Latino, or Asian American or Pacific Islander. Other farmers — white farmers, for example — are ineligible.”

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South African Farmer Reports on What Is Really Happening in His Country Regarding Land Seizure

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by Virginia Allen   When a recent report on the uncompensated seizure and redistribution of farmland held by white farmers in South Africa drew the concern of President Donald Trump, his South African counterpart told him to “stay out of our issues.” Subsequent reports have raised questions about how extensive the land expropriations are and the level of violence associated with the seizures. The African National Congress is the longtime ruling party in South Africa, and it is currently headed by that country’s president, Cyril Ramaphosa. Ramaphosa drew U.S. media scrutiny after Tucker Carlson, on his Fox News Channel show, reported Aug. 22 that Ramaphosa had begun “seizing land from his own citizens without compensation because they are the wrong skin color.” Carlson condemned the land seizure as “racist” because the South African government is largely black and the farmers in question are white, and he urged the U.S. State Department to condemn the move as well. After Carlson’s program aired the segment, Trump tweeted his reaction and asked Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to “look into the matter.” In a subsequent speech, Ramaphosa responded to Trump’s tweets by saying, “Stay out of our issues, and we will not get involved in your issues…

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