Page 19 - Export or Bust eBook

Meanwhile, Larry Kudlow, Trump’s new National Economic Council director, told CNN recently, “we

are talking to (farmers, and) there has been a bump-down in farm commodity prices ... (But) this process

may turn out to be very benign. OK? You have to take certain risks as you go in. We are taking them.

We are making our case. Nothing has happened so far ... maybe China will want to come around and
talk in earnest.”

Trump administration officials say they get the point. U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer,

under bombardment from both Republicans and Democrats at a recent U.S. Senate Finance Committee
hearing about the emerging trade war’s threat to farm income, argued, “We have trade rights that we
have to defend.” He acknowledged that, “too often farmers get the short end of the stick,” and
suggested, “we have to balance this” by somehow supporting farmers.

Trumpian style trade policy

Asked about his confidence in the president’s offensives on China and the North American Free Trade
Agreement (NAFTA), Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, a farmer, said “it’s so little.” However, Grassley
went on to say things aren’t all gloomy.

“I do feel a little bit better when China, without giving Trump and his brinksmanship credit … is going
to reduce the tariff on cars coming in from 25 percent down to 2 ½ percent … Korea (is) offering (to
take) more American cars.” Even with some tentative good news also coming out of NAFTA
negotiations, he said, “I am still very nervous about it … because if the brinksmanship doesn’t
work, agriculture is the first that is retaliated against.”

Conner, of NCFC, took a similar guarded, hopeful view at the recent Agri-Pulse Ag & Food Policy
Summit. “We all have to admit that the style of this administration makes us nervous. But the
point is, there are (trade) problems out there, and I think we’ve got an administration that’s
determined to address some of those problems ... (though) going after those problems comes at
some high risk.”

U.S. government trade policy “clearly has changed,” Conner said. He said that free trade has long been
an article of faith for most Republicans lawmakers, who were counted on to lead the approval of trade
deals. But Trump, “with his different view on trade, defeated many Republican candidates who were
considered the rock stars of the Republican Party – the president mopped the floor with them,” he said,
and the party has shifted in response.

Conner’s observation is illustrated in a letter that Rep. Kristi Noem, R-S.D., and 45 other farm-state
GOP House members sent to Trump, pleading for unspecified economic protection for farmers from
China’s trade retaliation. They had good reason to write: The top five agriculture products in Noem’s
own state, for example – beef, corn, soybeans, wheat, and hogs – are all targeted by China’s punitive
duties.

But the letter did not challenge Trump’s hardline style. It praised him repeatedly for supporting farmers,
blamed China solely for “threatening retaliation against American farmers,” while encouraging the
president to negotiate with China “in a manner that will avoid retaliation.”

Senate Agriculture Committee Chairman Pat Roberts, R-Kan., told the PBS News Hour he was hopeful

that farm state lawmakers did impress on Trump in a White House meeting that his unilateral actions
against China “is the wrong approach” and threatens U.S. farmers economically. Roberts said

www.Agri-Pulse.com 17