🌽State Farm Bureaus reach beyond ag policy

Aug. 1, 2024 The Midwest Center For Investigative Reporting

These agencies have influenced politics for 70+ years

Long known for offering insurance and other resources to farmers, including advocating for agriculture policy, some Farm Bureaus have branched out.

A seven-month long investigation by the Arnolt Center for Investigative Journalism, the University of Missouri, the University of Illinois, and Investigate Midwest found that while farm bureaus across the Midwest lobby for agricultural issues, it isn’t where the advocacy stops.

A review of campaign finance records, social media, lobbying disclosures, websites, and policy books in nine Midwestern states revealed that many of these state farm bureaus threw their weight behind political and social causes with little or nothing to do with farming: from the Indiana and Illinois farm bureaus favoring leaving “Under God” in the pledge of allegiance to the Missouri Farm Bureau opposing cloning humans.

Farm bureaus in Indiana, Michigan, Missouri, Iowa, Illinois, Minnesota, Nebraska, and Wisconsin did not respond to multiple calls and emails for comment. The Ohio Farm Bureau is the only organization to respond.

We are continuing to cover Farm Bureaus and their influence. Is there an aspect of the Farm Bureau you think is underreported or not getting enough attention? Email staff@investigatemidwest.org.

— Erin Orr, executive director

The reach of county, state farm bureaus extends beyond ag policy
By Annika Harshbarger, Char Jones, Haley Miller, Arnolt Center for Investigative Journalism, and Komlavi Adissem, University of Missouri

Danielle and Grace Perkowitz packed up and left Chicago two years ago for Houghton, Michigan, to start a career in goat farming.

“I had a joke for years — I’m going to start a goat farm,” Danielle Perkowitz said, co-owner of BigGoat Farm. “What are we waiting for? Let’s do it.”

As beginner farmers, they said, they hoped for support from the Michigan Farm Bureau to get their farm started. But they found the Farm Bureau didn’t align with their values, both as small farmers and as queer women.

“I think we like the idea of farming as rebellious, self-sustaining, and community oriented,” they wrote in an Instagram message to the Arnolt Center. “The farm bureau doesn’t seem to capture those ideals. It also doesn’t seem inclusive or supportive of diversity in farming.”

Read more.

GRAPHIC: Chicken farms are getting bigger — and fewer
By John McCracken, Investigate Midwest

The number of farms contracted to raise chickens for slaughter dropped by a third from 2002 to 2022. At that same time, the number of chickens raised on these farms grew 6%.

There were more than 20,000 farms in the country that raised broiler chickens, or chickens raised for meat processing, in 2002. Twenty years later, that number declined 32%, according to U.S. Department of Agriculture census data.

Nearly every chicken in the country is raised under a production contract, where major meat processors own the birds and the feed, while farmers are tasked with caring for the animals — and taking on debt to operate the farm.

View the graphic.

ICYMI: Dozens of USDA leaders had Farm Bureau connections before joining the agency
By Madison McVan, Investigate Midwest

Note: Occasionally we will reshare a previous investigation from our archive. This story originally published in 2022.

Reporting and more than 100 pages of emails obtained by Investigate Midwest via a public records request shed light on the movement of agriculture policy leaders between government, industry and the American Farm Bureau Federation.

Investigate Midwest found records of several federal government appointees with Farm Bureau ties, ranging from former state Farm Bureau presidents to state lawmakers who received awards or endorsements from the organization.

As of publication, 17 state directors of the USDA’s Farm Services Agency had a connection to the AFBF or its state and local counterparts, Investigate Midwest found in an analysis of FSA director bios, social media accounts and news clips. Under the Trump administration, 16 state FSA directors had a Farm Bureau connection before being appointed.

Read more here.

OPINION: Banning lab grown meat a cultural war issue
By Dave Dickey, Columnist

In a democracy, folks don’t go around willy-nilly banning things just because they don’t like them. That’s the case here. Cultured beef has become a GOP scapegoat. There is simply no reason for anyone, including ranchers, to worry about cultivated meat. In fact, cultivated meat is having serious growing pains and it’s far from clear whether it will survive long term.

The larger implication of all this meat madness surrounds using the growing practice to weaponize legislation to stifle innovation and maintain the status quo. It’s not uncommon for a legislative body to pass laws over an existing public safety concern – guns, pollution, a pandemic, and so forth. It’s quite another thing to legislate against something that isn’t a problem. Like cultured meat, which can fairly be deemed a struggling industry that the FDA says poses no danger to the public.

Read more.

News from our partners

One in 11 went hungry in 2023. Climate change is a big reason why. ByAyurella Horn-Muller, Grist

The California-to-Arkansas pipeline. By Lela Nargi, Ambrook Research

Investigate Midwest is an independent, nonprofit newsroom. Our mission is to serve the public as a watchdog over influential corporations and institutions through in-depth and data-driven investigative journalism.