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# Just Who Got Trump’s Farm Bailouts?
August 22 2019
Written by Jim Hightower.
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**LOVE, TRUMP STYLE**--Donald Trump *loves* farmers. We know this because he says so. “Farmers, I LOVE YOU!” he [declared](https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/1069577273819443200) in December.
But he’s been “loving” them to death, with policies that are causing farm prices to tumble, miring our ag economy in the ditch and creating a rising tsunami of farm bankruptcies.
Then came Trump’s doofus of an ag secretary, Sonny Perdue, who publicly insulted farmers by branding them “[whiners](https://www.huffpost.com/entry/sonny-perdue-whining-farmers-angry-reaction_n_5d51e64ce4b0c63bcbec0c10)” for daring to complain about policies causing them to lose income and their farms.
So, as an “I love you” make-up gesture, Trump has been sending big bouquets of money to some of his beloved farmers. *Our* money. Lots of it — $28 billion so far in what he cynically (and comically) calls a “Market Facilitation Program,” otherwise known as a taxpayer bailout.
But Trump Love turns out to be highly selective, with more than half of the government payments [going to the biggest farm owners](https://www.latimes.com/business/hiltzik/la-fi-hiltzik-trump-farm-bailout-20190528-story.html).
The Agriculture Department initially announced a $125,000 limit on the amount any one farm could get, but every Trump deal seems to have a gimmick in it to give a special break to the slickest operators.
The slickum in this deal is that assorted members of a family are allowed to claim that they’re owners of the same farm and thus get bailout bucks — even if they do no actual farming and live in New York City!
One Missouri farm family, for example, got [$2.8 million worth of subsidy love ](https://newfoodeconomy.org/trump-farm-bailout-trade-war-money-millions/)from Trump, and more than 80 families topped half-a-million in payments.
Meanwhile, the great majority of farmers have gotten zilch from Donald the Dealmaker — and 80 percent of eligible grain farmers (the smaller producers most endangered by his bad policies) have received less than $5,000.
So Trump’s “market facilitation” is squeezing the many who are most in need, while helping a few of the largest get even bigger.
*(OtherWords columnist Jim Hightower is a radio commentator, writer, and public speaker. Distributed by* [*OtherWords.org*](https://otherwords.org/just-who-got-trumps-farm-bailouts/)*.) Photo: Shutterstock. Prepped for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.*
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