Excerpt: In the eight years since the last Trump administration began, American farms have been repeatedly battered by extreme weather, requiring the USDA to direct tens of billions of dollars in disaster relief and crop insurance payouts to the country’s farmers.

“Many more farmers have had their eyes opened to the threat of climate change,” Perry Stillerman said. “Many more farmers have benefited from these giant investments in farming and conservation, and have gotten some incentives and support to shift their practices. That may be harder than people think to wind back.”

Also during those years, the most powerful agricultural lobby group, the American Farm Bureau Federation, shifted its position on climate change, influencing conversations in farm country. The group had long denied the scientific consensus that human activity is driving greenhouse gas emissions, but has since softened its denial as funding for climate-focused programs has flowed to farmers and as carbon markets, based on carbon storing-farming practices, have promised the potential of revenue to its members.

So far, farms and farmers have received roughly $7 billion to help them implement “climate smart” farming practices under the Biden administration’s signature climate legislation, the Inflation Reduction Act. Another $13 billion or so is still on the way, though Congress’ efforts to pass a Farm Bill, which would direct those funds in coming years, are stalled. Republican versions of the legislation call for removing the requirement that the funding support climate-specific practices.

The USDA is investing another $3 billion in climate-focused agricultural practices under the agency’s Partnership for Climate Smart Commodities.

“No matter what happens in the Farm Bill, the USDA hands out billions and billions of dollars every year,” said Rebecca Riley, the managing director for food and agriculture at the Natural Resources Defense Council. “Rollins would have a huge influence over that.”

“Farmers are on the front lines of the climate crisis,” Riley added, “so if you’re the U.S. Secretary of Agriculture it’s hard to deny that climate change is a problem and it’s affecting the very people your agency is supposed to be supporting.”

Rollins is the founder and current president of the America First Policy Institute (AFPI), a group of Trump loyalists formed in 2020 by wealthy Texans that was heavily involved in Trump’s run for a second term. In Washington circles, it was known as Trump’s administration-in-waiting.

AFPI’s agenda calls for blocking foreign countries from purchasing American farmland, with the group applauding state bills that would prevent more purchases. The group is especially critical of China’s purchase of land, calling it a “threat to America.” But it says little else on agriculture, unlike Project 2025, the blueprint for Trump’s second term coordinated by the Heritage Foundation, which calls specifically for cutting back the Conservation Reserve Program and limiting crop insurance subsidies, among other rollbacks.

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