Harris’ and Trump’s contrasting plans for agriculture and climate change action • South Dakota Searchlight

Hans Breitenmoser believes that regardless of a farmer’s political affiliation, everything comes down to the weather.

“Whether you grow cows or grow corn or both, we live and die by the weather forecast,” said Breitenmoser, a 55-year-old dairy farmer from Lincoln County, Wisconsin.

That’s why the impact of climate change policies from Donald Trump and Kamala Harris on the agriculture sector is top of mind for the lifelong farmer.

Investigate Midwest researched the Trump and Biden-Harris administrations to better understand what could be at stake this election at the intersection of environment and agriculture. While President Joe Biden is not seeking reelection, his four years in office offer possible clues for what a Harris presidency might mean as the vice president has become the Democratic nominee.

The Biden-Harris administration has poured billions into agriculture practices meant to curtail greenhouse gas emissions, but some environmentalists say not all of the practices are climate-friendly. Meanwhile, Trump has a history of downplaying the threat of climate change, and various Republican playbook strategies plan on slashing funding to “climate-smart” agriculture programs.

“You’ve got one administration that’s taken this thing seriously and understands that we can have a robust economy while becoming greener, and then you’ve got the other side who doesn’t even think there’s a problem,” Breitenmoser said.

Climate change — predominantly caused by human activities such as the burning of fossil fuels, deforestation and industrialized agriculture — has made the weather more volatile and extreme.

Extreme weather touches every aspect of agriculture. Increased flooding has drowned crops across the Midwest, droughts have brought the nation’s beef supply to historic lows and farmworkers are also more prone to heat-related injury and illness.

“As the weather changes, it’s going to have a profound impact on how we do business,” said Breitenmoser, who has had to spend more money on hay in recent drought years and is currently debating having to spend more money on nitrogen to perk up a wet soybean crop.

Ranjani Prabhakar, the legislative director of healthy communities for Earthjustice, a nonprofit environmental law center, worries another Trump administration would immediately roll back funding for farming practices aimed to cut greenhouse gas emissions.

“There’s a possibility that $19 billion of historic generational climate investments in agriculture could be completely lost,” she said.

The nation’s agriculture sector accounted for 10% of all greenhouse gas emissions in 2022, according to U.S. Environmental Protection Agency data. The agency cites cattle production, rice crops and the application of chemical fertilizers as major sources of climate pollution.

But Republican leaders see Biden’s agricultural policies and investments in climate change as restrictive and onerous for the nation’s farmers. This division has delayed a highly anticipated Farm Bill and signals how either administration could approach climate change after the election.

Jeff Kaufmann, a livestock farmer, former Iowa state lawmaker and current chairman of the state’s Republican Party, told Agri Pulse that he expects to see the end of “blind climate change policies” that won’t hinder agricultural producers under a new Trump administration.

“I think you are going to see fairness based on science and we haven’t had that in four years,” Kaufman said.

U.S. Rep. Glenn GT Thompson, a Pennsylvania Republican who chairs the House Committee on Agriculture, told Investigate Midwest he supports voluntary, locally-run and incentive-based conservation efforts for agriculture producers, and rebukes the Biden administration’s imposal of climate regulations onto American farmers.

“Agriculture has done more to reduce carbon emissions than anything else, certainly (more than) any government regulation,” said Thompson, speaking at this year’s Republican National Convention.

Thompson, calling American farmers the “original climate champions,” said farmers who use conservation practices have been able to create healthy soils and sequester carbon to avoid releasing it into the atmosphere.

The secret to keeping the nation’s farmers at the center is making the programs voluntary and locally-led, rather than imposing broad rules and regulations, Thompson added.

Biden-Harris climate investments, pitfalls

To combat climate change’s effects on farming, the Biden-Harris Administration allotted an historic $22 billion to fund “climate-smart” agriculture two years ago. This funding was part of the administration’s sweeping investments in clean energy and climate solutions, known as the Inflation Reduction Act, or IRA.

Included in the bill was funding for farm operations to implement cover crops and proper management of nutrient application, be it fertilizer or livestock waste, as well as no-till and strip-till farming.

But, this influx of funding has created a division between lawmakers tasked with crafting the industry’s most important piece of legislation, the Farm Bill. The most recent version now puts the USDA in charge of managing IRA funds for agriculture.

Republican lawmakers have said they want to strip the word “climate” from the legislation, while Democrats have said they won’t budge on funding for these climate-smart practices. Biden spokesperson John Podesta said last year the administration is willing to fight for climate-smart agriculture as it is popular for farmers and will be “successful in the upcoming farm bill negotiations.”

Additionally, Harris argued for increased funding for clean energy jobs and energy efficiencies while in the White House. During her time as California attorney general, she created an office responsible for litigating against polluters who operated in historically disadvantaged communities.

At the Sept. 10 presidential debate, Harris extolled the current administration’s push for clean energy jobs and manufacturing, while also promoting the nation’s increase in domestic oil production and her support of fracking.

However, Harris hasn’t been detailed about her specific approach to climate change and agriculture, and her campaign did not respond to a request for comment.

Still, environmental justice and climate change advocates have rallied in support of Harris since she became the Democratic nominee.

“Vice President Harris has fought to hold polluters accountable and deliver for the hardest-hit communities her entire career. We are confident that she is ready to carry forward President Biden’s historic legacy and set a new high bar for climate ambition in America,” Lena Moffitt, the executive director of climate advocacy group Evergreen Action, said in a statement.

Harris selected Tim Walz as her vice presidential running mate. The current governor of Minnesota, Walz has an extensive climate-focused and clean energy track record and also worked on Farm Bills during his time in Congress. His background in agricultural policy is a boon to Harris, but environmental groups have called out past actions supporting industrialized, emissions-heavy agriculture and allowing the Line 3 pipeline to continue construction in his state.

While the Biden-Harris administration has been lauded for climate efforts, some environmental groups believe the administration has not gone far enough. Despite the investments in climate, the country exported record amounts of fossil fuels under the Biden-Harris Administration.

Environmental groups have urged the Biden-Harris administration to stop investing in methane, a major contributor to climate pollution.

Methane, a potent greenhouse gas that warms the atmosphere faster than carbon, is produced by livestock waste and ruminant livestock. These animals, like cattle, sheep and goats, have unique digestive systems and diets linked to increased methane emissions.

The EPA estimates that methane from animals makes up 11% of the agriculture sector’s greenhouse gas emissions. The Biden Administration announced rules in 2021 to reduce the country’s methane emissions across various sectors, including agriculture.

A major initiative seen across the country has been the capture of methane on farms using technologies known as biogas digesters.

Digesters are massive, air-tight domes where livestock waste is converted into fuel through a process known as anaerobic digestion. Once the methane is turned into a fuel source, it is often used on the farm to power routine operations, or it can be sold to a pipeline grid for additional farm revenue.

The Inflation Reduction Act set aside billions of dollars in tax credits for new digester facilities and technologies, billed as a clean energy source. However, digesters are a controversial climate solution in the agricultural space.

Various environmental and climate groups have called on the Biden Administration to remove government support for digesters, believing that digesters incentivize large-scale, industrial livestock operations that are linked to environmental pollution and public health problems.

Digesters still leak and emit methane, and according to the USDA, the tracking of methane leaked from digesters is limited.

Earlier this year, a group of Democratic lawmakers sent a letter to the USDA asking for the removal of digesters from government-funded programs, arguing that the supposed climate tool is “an inefficient use of taxpayer dollars and an ineffective way to advance climate goals.”

Trump’s climate reversal

Trump has a lengthy record of downplaying and reversing climate change policy and has announced plans to reverse Biden administration investments in climate funding.

“It actually sets us back, as opposed to moves us forward. And [I will] rescind all unspent funds under the misnamed Inflation Reduction Act,” Trump said in early September, according to Politico.

Earlier this year, Trump made promises to a roomful of oil executives to revert pollution regulations and pauses on oil expansion made by the Biden-Harris Administration on his first day of office, according to a recent Washington Post report.

Pipeline won’t capture all carbon emitted by ethanol plants

It wouldn’t be the first time he has rolled back environmental protections.

Trump’s climate track record includes more than 100 reversals of climate and environmentally-focused rules that originated in the Obama era. A New York Times analysis found that the majority of his rollbacks were aimed at EPA rules that limited greenhouse gas emissions from vehicles and power plants, as well as those protecting the nation’s wetlands.

During his first presidency, the USDA stopped publishing government studies that mentioned climate change, according to a 2019 Politico investigation. He also pulled the U.S. out of the Paris Agreement on climate change.

Trump’s campaign did not respond to a request for comment.

The Republican Party’s official 2024 platform makes no mention of climate change nor its impact on agriculture. The platform document outlines plans to expand American-made fossil fuel production.

Another conservative policy playbook has more direct plans to roll back policy and funding for climate solutions in agriculture.

The 2025 Presidential Transition Project, an initiative circulated and organized by right-wing policy groups and advocacy organizations, has released plans to secure conservative policies under a Trump administration. Trump has disavowed any relation with this controversial document, but numerous authors of the manifesto have previously worked for him.

“Never before has the whole conservative movement banded together to systematically prepare to take power day one and deconstruct the administrative state,” Paul Dans, director of Project 2025, told Energy & Environment News last year.

Project 2025 outlines that the next USDA would remove the country from any “schemes” to produce sustainable food or provide funding for climate-smart practices for producers.

“From the outset, the next Administration should: Denounce efforts to place ancillary issues like climate change ahead of food productivity and affordability when it comes to agriculture,” the document states.

Project 2025 also outlines plans to defund the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the National Weather Service, which it described as “one of the main drivers of the climate change alarm industry.”

Paul Overby, a North Dakota grain farmer and volunteer with the environmental advocacy group Citizens Climate Lobby and a self-described “traditional Republican,” said he worries that the partisan fight over climate change in agriculture conversations will continue to derail an already delayed Farm Bill.

He said that he would be willing to compromise on taking the words “climate change” out of the Farm Bill if funding for conservation was increased because “the net result would be the same.”

“The focus on climate has — unfortunately — become partisan,” he said.

Jennifer Bamberg contributed to this reporting.