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Exclusive: Vilsack concerned as shutdown gets closer
A government shutdown is looming and Ag Secretary Tom Vilsack says it hasn’t been easy to watch.
“You don’t want to take my blood pressure today, let’s put it that way.”
Secretary Vilsack tells Brownfield the people who administer USDA programs won’t be able to work and that’s a costly disruption for U.S. farmers and ranchers.
“If there’s a farmer seeking help with operating expenses, the ability to close those loans in the conversation stage is at risk,” says Vilsack. “There might be farmers in and around the country anxious to get an Ag Risk Coverage, Price Loss Coverage or Conservation Reserve Program payment and those payments will also be delayed.”
Vilsack says USDA’s marketing and weekly sales reports will be delayed, along with the Federal Milk Marketing Order hearing.
And during a shutdown, Vilsack says the essential employees are defined as…”people who are specifically and directly focused on protecting life and property, for the most part, who are considered under the law as essential.”
The U.S. Senate has indicated it wants to move forward with a continuing resolution, but the House is still trying to advance spending bills. This week, the House debated an ag appropriations bill with proposed cuts to USDA spending by almost 20% and an amendment blocking any work on the Packers and Stockyards Act. And Vilsack says…
“It’s a question of: whose side are you on? Are you on the side of the packers, the big companies that have had a monopoly for an extended period of time or are you on the side of the livestock producers who need a fair price?”
Congress has through Saturday night to reach an agreement and fund the government.
Hear the full interview.
Tags: government shutdown, Tom Vilsack, USDA
Look at the bright side, atleast money will not be wasted on the cllmate change hoax and the Nuremberg Crime of coercion of Mexico to buy GMO corn. This is some kind of no-pork budget that most Americans do really suoport. Ask Vilsack whose side he is on if not the American population who can no longer afford to buy decent food for themselves and their families because of runaway congressional spending and failed economic policies and woke ideologies of the current administation. Also, ask him why farmers were directed to destroy their crops ready to harvest or have their farms destroyed by Agent Orange. Seriously, what good does it do to have a nutritionist when there is no food? Any lastly, Vilsack should voluntarily reduce his own salary to $1 of just go cry me a river and then jump in. And what about the hundreds of billions of US taxpayer dollars which are still being sent to Ukraine shut down or no shutdown?