June is nearly half gone, July Fourth creates a break and then there is the August recess. So Congress’ Democrat majority feels the pressure to get some things done before election season begins in September. Executive branch agencies are also hustling to try to get done what has been blocked in Congress in case they lose the majority in either or both houses in November.
The Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) has denied a petition submitted by Food and Water Watch, the Consumer Federation of America, Consumer Reports and several individuals seeking to declare certain salmonella serotypes as “adulterants,” the North American Meat Institute (NAMI) noted. This would have created substantial problems and risks for ground beef and poultry processors.
FSIS denied the petition on the basis there’s not “sufficient data available at this time to support the sweeping actions requested in (this) petition.” The agency did indicate it is still in the process of reevaluating salmonella control in poultry.
The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has generated a lot of flak from all over with an incredible proposal. Responding to President Joe Biden’s executive order for all agencies to look at everything possible to slip in climate change requirements, the SEC has proposed requiring every publicly traded company to tally everything they do that (supposedly) contributes to climate change and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Not satisfied with such a gargantuan undertaking, the SEC also wants such corporations to require all their supply chain companies to do the same, which could mean that everyone in agriculture who sells to a major corporation would have to tally everything they do that generates GHGs.
Imagine counting up every step of a calf’s life from semen tank or bull to the packing plant and calculating GHG emissions. The enviro-zealots want to impose untold expenses and work on everyone else on Earth, but they still can’t prove man has much to do with geologic and atmospheric change on Earth.
The Biden administration has planned three Packers and Stockyards Act rule-makings as efforts to promote competition, reduce consolidation and fight inflation, NAMI noted while commenting on the first proposal.
This new one is very different from previous attempts by USDA in 2010 and 2016 to regulate poultry contracting, which proposed direct restrictions on contracting, NAMI said. Neither of those proposals were finalized. USDA’s Agricultural Marketing Service’s (AMS) proposed rule this time reflects a different approach, focusing on disclosures. AMS holds that “many production contracts do not provide enough information for growers to assess their expected value.”
Along with all the obvious things the Biden administration has done to restrict the production of gas and oil, not much attention has been paid to a couple others. Future Corporate Average Fuel Economy standards have been bumped up twice in the next few years, allowing very little time to get fleet averages up to 54.5 miles per gallon by 2025. The ethanol blending requirements are more of the same head-scratching regulations, common with this crew.
In an announcement only a Biden agency could understand, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) raised the ethanol blending requirement for 2022 to 15 billion gallons but retroactively decreased the 2020 level by 2.5 billion gallons and 2021 level by 1.2 billion gallons. Ethanol production uses up more than 40 percent of the corn crop. Of course, what’s good news for corn farmers is a prop causing higher feed prices for cattlemen.
You might have noted that Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign lawyer who handled much of the work of concocting the fake connections between former President Donald Trump and Russia and selling them to the FBI was acquitted. This occurred despite emails, witnesses and other evidence that lawyer Michael Sussmann lied to the FBI to engender an investigation by special prosecutor Robert Mueller.
The reason this is important to agriculture is that it illustrates the very real bias in the Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C. This is the court that hears any challenges to federal agency regulations. Any regulation challenged by the beef industry and promulgated by USDA, EPA, Department of Justice, Department of the Interior, etc., goes to that court. The jury pool is drawn from the District of Columbia, 92 percent of which voted for Biden. Former President Barack Obama expanded the size of the court and nominated several more judges during his term, adding more jurists of a big government persuasion.
Challenging any regulation on the basis of constitutionality faces a serious uphill climb going through the D.C. Court of Appeals.
Recession or not? Economists are quite divided as to whether we will have one or not. Two things are for sure: Biden doesn’t have a clue—or doesn’t care—to head one off, and he will blame the Federal Reserve if one happens. — Steve Dittmer, WLJ columnist
(Steve Dittmer is the author of the Agribusiness Freedom Foundation newsletter. Views in the column do not necessarily represent the views or opinions of WLJ or its editorial staff.)
