President-elect Joe Biden’s selection of Tom Vilsack as agriculture secretary angered farm and food activists who feuded with Vilsack during the Obama years and had hoped for a progressive agenda under Biden. The largest U.S. farm groups welcomed Vilsack on Wednesday as an experienced leader for the recovery from the trade war and the pandemic.
A former governor of Iowa, Vilsack advised Biden on rural and agricultural issues and campaigned frequently for him. As agriculture secretary for President Obama, he was a proponent of biofuels, larger farm exports, rural economic development and public nutrition programs. He has argued that Democrats must build support in rural America, which now votes heavily for Republicans, to assure national success. Rural populists, yearning for a fire-breathing platform, fault Vilsack as too moderate politically.
The Biden transition team has not said when the president-elect will formally announce his nominee to lead the USDA, despite widespread reports that it will be Vilsack. Some opponents hoped to raise a ruckus and change Biden’s mind, although Vilsack has significant support.
“Tom Vilsack understands that the agriculture sector is far more complex than most people understand,” said Zippy Duvall, president of the American Farm Bureau Federation. “He believes in a ‘big tent’ philosophy that supports all types of production, and understands the importance of respecting farmers and ranchers as partners worthy of support in the race to achieve sustainability goals.”
The National Farmers Union said Vilsack has “the necessary qualifications and experience” to guide the USDA through turbulent times. President Rob Larew called for policies that give farmers a stronger hand in dealing with processors, reduce overproduction, advance racial equity, and help the sector adapt to climate change.
“However, the secretary’s obligation is not just to serve farmers; it’s also to serve the American public at large,” said Larew. “We would urge Vilsack to expand nutrition assistance programs” to cope with hunger during the pandemic.
The Food Research and Action Center, an anti-hunger group, said that with the arrival of Vilsack, “the country can quickly implement a more comprehensive response to the hunger crisis.” The Trump administration repeatedly blocked a temporary increase in SNAP benefits this year.
Critics said Vilsack failed to stand up to Big Ag and was disappointing on such issues as agricultural marketing rules, country-of-origin labels on meat, and support for small farmers. The Obama administration held a series of hearings on consolidation in the meat industry, but there was little follow-through. Reformers had hoped for a transformational leader at the USDA under Biden to elevate the importance of public nutrition programs, which account for two-thirds of the USDA budget, and to support small farmers and local marketing of food.
“I can’t think of a food or ag issue EWG works on or Food Policy Action tracks that Vilsack didn’t disappoint or sell out on during the Obama administration,” said Ken Cook, head of the Environmental Working Group, on social media. “We’re putting together a list.”
Agricultural columnist Alan Guebert wrote, “I had no idea Joe Biden was such a recycler that he’d take Vilsack for another tour of both-siderism with Big Ag and the Greens.”
The National Black Farmers Association said Vilsack “will certainly be a big improvement” over the Trump agriculture secretary, Sonny Perdue. “And while Black farmers had legislative successes during the Obama administration, far too little was done during his tenure to address the long legacy of discrimination against Black farmers.” NBFA president John Boyd said Vilsack needed to end systemic discrimination against Black farmers in USDA programs.
NAACP president Derrick Johnson told Biden during a meeting with civil rights leaders that he opposed Vilsack at the USDA, reported the Washington Post, citing “a person familiar with the meeting.”
Vilsack has apologized for forcing the hasty resignation in 2010 of Shirley Sherrod, the USDA director of rural development in Georgia, after a conservative news site manipulated snippets of a speech by Sherrod to falsely portray her as anti-white.
Although Congress blocked USDA actions for a number of years, the agency issued a package of rules in the final weeks of the Obama administration to make it easier for livestock producers to prove unfair treatment at the hands of processors and packers. The incoming Trump administration killed the fair play rules and an Obama regulation setting animal welfare standards on organic farms, and halted work on a proposed checkoff program for organics.