A veteran soybean farmer explains why Trump earns an F- for tariffs, bailouts, and policies that crushed farmers and fueled corporate land grabs.
Farmer Gives Trump an F-
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Summary
This segment exposes how deliberate policy choices devastated farmers while enriching corporate agriculture. Laid bare is the economic sabotage inflicted on American farmers through reckless tariffs, trade wars, and hollow bailouts. Drawing from the powerful testimony of John Boyd Jr., the discussion shows how Donald Trump’s policies intentionally squeezed small and Black farmers, collapsed soybean markets, and accelerated land transfers to large corporations. Farmers faced overflowing grain elevators, collapsing prices, unpaid mortgages, and exclusion from policy tables. At the same time, consumers saw no relief at grocery stores—an indictment of a rigged economic system that protects corporate profit over human survival.
Five key points:
- Trump’s tariffs on China, Mexico, and Canada destroyed export markets for soybeans, corn, and fertilizer.
- Soybean prices collapsed from roughly $16–18 per bushel to under $8, forcing farmers to stop harvesting.
- Grain elevators filled up as exports dried up, leaving crops to rot while farm mortgages came due.
- The much-touted $12 billion “bailout” arrived too late and paid too little to save family farms.
- Black farmers faced compounded harm through discrimination, exclusion, and racially skewed immigration and land policies.
The testimony makes clear that this was not a policy failure by accident but economic violence by design, punishing farmers to consolidate land and power upward.
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This commentary confronts a hard truth often ignored in corporate media: American farmers did not simply stumble into crisis; they were pushed. The evidence comes straight from the fields, voiced with urgency and credibility by John Boyd Jr., president of the National Black Farmers Association and a soybean farmer with more than four decades of experience. His verdict on Donald Trump’s performance—an unequivocal F-minus—reflects lived reality, not partisan rhetoric.
The trade war sits at the center of this destruction. Tariffs imposed on China erased the single largest buyer of American soybeans almost overnight. Fertilizer costs rose as Canada became collateral damage. These decisions ripped apart supply chains that farmers depend on to survive. Markets collapsed, prices cratered, and farmers who had planned seasons months in advance suddenly faced ruin. Boyd’s account of halting soybean harvests for the first time in 42 years because grain elevators were completely full is not anecdote—it is an indictment.
The so-called bailout only deepened that indictment. Trump’s administration framed the $12 billion payment as relief, yet farmers could not access the funds for months, long after mortgages, loans, and operating expenses came due. Even when aid arrived, it amounted to pennies on the dollar. For many Black farmers with small acreage, payments translated into about $1,500—an amount that cannot cover fuel, seed, labor, and debt, let alone save a farm. Meanwhile, tens of billions flowed freely to foreign governments and corporate interests, exposing whose survival truly mattered.
This crisis also revealed how racism and exclusion remain embedded in agricultural policy. Boyd described being denied a seat at the White House table while policies affecting his livelihood were crafted. At the same time, Trump promoted fast-track citizenship and land access for white South African farmers, while demonizing immigrants—many of whom form the backbone of U.S. agricultural labor. These contradictions stripped away any pretense of “America First.” What emerged instead was a hierarchy: corporate agribusiness at the top, small farmers squeezed below, and Black and immigrant farmers pushed furthest to the margins.
The consumer side of this story further exposes systemic fraud. Despite massive oversupply, grocery prices for soybean oil and soybean-dependent products never dropped substantively. Farmers lost income while corporations preserved margins. This disconnect proves that the capitalist market, as sold to the public, does not function fairly at all. It operates as a managed system that socializes loss among producers while privatizing profit for middlemen, processors, and conglomerates.
Reputable economic analyses support these claims. The U.S. Department of Agriculture documented billions in losses tied directly to tariff retaliation. Studies from the Economic Research Service and reporting by outlets such as The New York Times and Reuters have shown that most tariff “relief” flowed to the most significant operations, accelerating consolidation and driving small farms out of business. This outcome aligns precisely with Boyd’s warning: policies designed to bankrupt farmers so corporations can buy their land cheaply.
The broader lesson extends beyond agriculture. When the government weaponizes policy to favor concentrated wealth, democracy erodes alongside livelihoods. Farmers become expendable. Workers become invisible. Communities hollow out. What Boyd articulated was not merely anger but a call for accountability and solidarity across race and class lines. He reminded listeners that an economy that cannot sustain those who feed the nation is not broken—it is functioning exactly as designed.
