Minnesota farmers have longed for a new farm bill. The One Big Beautiful Bill might be the best they get for now.
While the fate of the 2025 Farm Bill is uncertain, Congress hasn’t passed one since 2018. That one expired in 2023, and federal lawmakers since then have only been able to agree on short extensions with minor revisions.
Meanwhile, President Donald Trump’s huge new budget reconciliation law contains $66 billion in new spending to support key agricultural programs, some of which would ordinarily be addressed in a farm bill.
“There were a lot of components in that Big Beautiful Bill … that were really critical,” said Dana Allen-Tully, a dairy farmer in Eyota. “We’re thankful that Congress got some provisions passed.”
Although that help was well received by Minnesota farmers at Farmfest last week, enthusiasm for the legislation was dampened by concerns over inflation, commodity prices and Trump tariffs that have upended global trade and increased uncertainty.
What’s in the OBBB for farmers?
The reconciliation bill makes big changes in USDA programs that have been sought by the nation’s farmers.
Besides increasing reference prices and crop insurance premium subsidies, the budget bill’s changes to USDA policy means Minnesota’s sugar beet growers will likely get higher prices for their crops. And the state’s dairy farmers will benefit from a more generous “dairy margin” program that insures against a drop in milk prices.
House Agriculture Committee Chairman Glenn “GT” Thompson considered those provisions to be “80% of a farm bill.”
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One of the provisions is a doubling of federal dollars for agriculture trade promotion, a move aimed at countering the impact of trade wars that are likely to be touched off by Trump’s tariffs.
“We use those funds to develop international markets for ag,” Allen-Tully said. “The doubling of those dollars helps us get market access in other countries.”
Bob Worth, a soybean farmer in Lake Benton, also said the boost trade promotion money, to more than $500 million, is “going to help a lot.”
“They haven’t raised that price for 20 years,” Worth said. “With inflation it was actually cut down to probably 40% of what it was. Now we’re back stronger than what we were.”
Still, Minnesota farmers are looking for more help from Washington, D.C. in these uncertain times for agriculture.
“There are things only a farm bill can do,” said Minnesota Farm Bureau Federation President Dan Glessing.
The budget reconciliation bill is limited to making changes in programs that raise or spend federal dollars. But the legislation is proscribed from making policy changes.
So, there’s hope Congress will pass a “skinny” farm bill to try to address other concerns.
“We still need the policy side of the farm bill and there’s not a lot of time,” Glessing said.
Kyle Jore, a soybean farmer in the Thief River Falls area, said he’s glad Congress has addressed some concerns, but said the reconciliation bill “is still not the farm bill. It’s pieces of the farm bill.”
‘Nobody wins a trade war’
Minnesota farmers hope a true farm bill will outlaw Proposition 12, a 2018 ballot initiative in California that restricts the sale of pork, veal and egg products from animals confined in ways that don’t meet minimum space requirements. Other states have adopted similar initiatives.
Those state laws have forced Minnesota farmers to spend money on the way they confine their animals or lose important domestic markets.
Another thing that’s on corn growers’ farm bill wish list is a mandate for year-long, nationwide use of E15, a fuel blend consisting of 15% ethanol and 85% gasoline.
And Glessing said the reconciliation act’s attempt to shore up the farm safety net “comes at a cost” because they are paid for by cuts to food stamps, a program supported by the nation’s farmers.
Cost cutting measures in the act include the imposition of new regulations on food stamp recipients that are aimed at shrinking the program, which is officially known as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). The act also shifts administrative costs of running the program to states and counties.
So, there’s hope among some farmers — and congressional Democrats — of rolling back some of those cuts to SNAP in a farm bill, which is usually the legislative vehicle to make changes in the food stamp program.
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But what many farmers view as a major threat to the farm economy can’t be helped by a new farm bill.
Many of the state’s soybean farmers and pork producers are still feeling the effect of the tariffs Trump imposed on China during his first term which nearly shut down a growing new market for their products after Beijing retaliated. Trump’s latest tariff policy is global and could have an even bigger impact.
“Obviously there are retaliatory tariffs that are on my product, pork products,” said Randy Spronk, past president of the National Pork Producers Council. “We’re paying a 57% tariff going into China right now.”
Gov. Tim Walz was also at Farmfest and eager to speak about Trump’s tariffs.
“Nobody wins a trade war,” Walz told reporters. “The longer these trade wars drag on, or the discussions of a trade war, you lose access to markets. And when you lose access to a market, just like last one, we lost our soybean market in China, they went to Brazil, and now Brazil has that market.”
Yet Stephen Vaden, U.S. Deputy Secretary of Agriculture, who spoke at a Farmfest forum, said Trump’s trade policy would instead open doors to U.S. agricultural products.
Vaden said trade deals Trump has announced on Truth Social and the social platform X “is what’s going on behind the scenes” of many negotiations that will favor American farmers.
“When a country comes to the United States and they want to negotiate their tariff rate, among the first things they’re asked is what can you do for American agriculture,” Vaden said.
However, a big problem with trade deals with European countries has long been its barriers to major U.S. agricultural products, which seem to be unaffected by Trump’s deal with the European Commission.
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