Before you read on, a quick note. Not too long ago I got an email from someone unsubscribing from On Pasture saying, “Politics doesn’t belong in grazing.” That may be true, but politicians don’t know that. From grazing fees in the West, to how you manage grazing around streams that run through your property, to subsidies for implementing conservation practices, to even some of the grass varieties growing in your pastures, politics has been all over grazing for ages. That means graziers ought to pay attention to politics a bit, at least the kind that impacts their daily lives. So, with that in mind, this is my take on some politics that could hit you, some of my favorite people, pretty hard.
Here’s why farmers, ranchers, and small-town communities must speak up now.
There’s been a lot of noise about the One Big Beautiful Bill Act—mostly about cuts to Medicaid and SNAP. And yes, those cuts will hit rural folks hard. But even if those parts are walked back, the bill is still packed with policies that threaten the future of rural America.
If you care about the land, your livelihood, or your local community, now’s the time to speak up. Because this bill isn’t built for you. It’s built for billionaires, corporate interests, and people who’ve never worked a day on a farm or lived in a town with one stoplight.
Farm Subsidies for Wall Street, Not Working Farmers
I wrote about this in detail a couple of weeks ago. The short story is that the bill changes who can receive USDA subsidies, making it easier for wealthy investors with no real connection to agriculture to qualify for payments. That means fewer resources for real producers and more for people who treat agriculture like a tax shelter. The cost for these subsidies to the already well-off is an additional $53 billion added to the deficit.
Meanwhile, programs that help smaller producers, promote conservation, or support local and regional food systems are either defunded or gutted. OBBB largely sidelines critical support systems for conservation grants, forestry stewardship, rural community infrastructure, and local-market development.
Small and mid-sized producers reliant on market access, forest health grants, and watershed programs may find themselves left behind as the bill prioritizes commodity subsidies and large-scale operations.
Slashing the Weather Forecasts You Rely On
As I noted last week, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the National Weather Service face deep cuts under this bill. That means fewer local forecasts, degraded radar coverage, and slower warnings for severe storms, fire weather, and drought.
If you’re planning when to irrigate, cut hay, or calve your cows, you know how vital timely, local forecasts are. Cutting this service endangers lives, livestock, and livelihoods.
FEMA Cuts Mean You’re on Your Own After Disaster
Under this bill, FEMA’s budget is cut by nearly 30%. That means fewer staff, longer delays, and less help after wildfires, floods, and tornadoes. When disaster strikes rural areas, help is already slower to arrive. This bill would make that worse and put your communities at even greater risk.
Rural Hospitals and Clinics Will Take a Hit
The bill’s healthcare cuts don’t just affect patients. They impact jobs and services. Rural hospitals already struggle to stay open. This bill would lead to layoffs, closed departments, and even shuttered facilities in some regions. Less access to care means more risk for pregnant women, aging parents, and folks managing chronic conditions like diabetes or heart disease. It means that even though you may not feel the cuts to Medicaid directly, you’ll be impacted anyway.
Cuts to Rural Schools, Colleges, and Head Start
From K–12 to community colleges and Head Start programs, the bill reduces federal funding for education, particularly for programs that support rural and low-income children. That means more school closures, fewer teachers, and fewer opportunities to build a future right there at home.
Goodbye to Public Research and Innovation
The National Institute of Health, USDA research, clean energy programs, and rural broadband grants all face major cuts or slow death by bureaucracy. OBBBA proposes a 25% cut to NIH, targeting grants to universities and research hospitals. This undermines research into cancer, Alzheimer’s, diabetes, mental health, and infectious disease. USDA research cuts likewise target universities and reduce programs that ensure farmers have drought-resistant crops and ranchers get range science updates. Cuts to broadband leave rural communities behind when it comes to accessing everything available online for their urban counterparts.
The U.S. has long been a leader in these fields of research. Without them, we fall behind, not just in global competition, but in daily life.
Public Lands Up for Sale
The bill allows the federal government to sell off public lands through secret, no-bid deals. That means land currently used for grazing, hunting, fishing, or recreation could be handed over to mining companies and developers—with no say from the people who live nearby.
This map, compiled by the Outdoor Alliance shows what could potentially be sold as part of the Senate’s addition to the OBBBA.
Big Tax Breaks for Corporations, Not Us
We’ve been told this bill would help small businesses, but the biggest winners are large corporations and the ultra-wealthy. Tax cuts in the bill will explode the deficit by trillions while your town loses its hospital, your school loses its teachers, and your roads and broadband go unfixed.
What You Can Do
This bill isn’t inevitable. But if rural voices stay quiet, it will pass—and the damage will be long-term.
✅ Call your representatives today. You can find your Representative or Senator here, or by calling 202-224-3121
✅ Tell them: “Even if Medicaid and SNAP cuts are removed, this bill is still bad for rural America. I’m asking you to vote NO.”
✅ Share this with your neighbors, your co-op, your local paper, and on Facebook or church bulletin boards.
Rural America Deserves Better
You work hard. You take care of each other and feed this country. You deserve a fair deal, not one that sacrifices your well-being to fund handouts for Wall Street.
Call now. This may be the most important thing you do for your farm, your family, and your future this year.
I don’t care for your left leaning opinion and negative outlook. Is there nothing good in this bill? Just doesn’t sound right or pass the smell test with me.
Fair enough, Tod. Let me try to show you the good things in the bill, and along the way I’ll share my personal bias/opinion so you’ll know exactly where I’m coming from.
Is there good stuff in the bill? It depends on where you are on the economic ladder. For example, if you’re in corporate ag, it boosts your subsidies. The limit to how many acres you can receive subsidies on goes up, the level of the subsidies increases, and so you benefit. Likewise if you invest in farming, your income goes up as well because the bill now allows for pass throughs to investors even if they’re not directly involved in farming. The upshot of all of this is that the big get bigger and the small go out. So if you’re big, you like it. If you’re small, you’ll go out and find a job somewhere else. That is an agricultural policy that some administrations promote because they think it feeds more people more efficiently and because if you’re good at what you do you should get extra rewards.
Here’s my bias: I have seen corporate ag hollow out rural communities, because there are fewer people managing their own places, fewer people making money, so fewer people to keep the local economy going. Schools shut down, hospitals shut down. It feels bad to me. I also don’t think it’s a very resilient food system. When we run into trouble, like we did during the pandemic, we’ve seen that the supply chain suffers when we rely on only big producers. That’s why, post-pandemic, there was a move to improve local food systems so that small communities would benefit, and our food supply would be more resilient. This particular ag policy also adds $53 billion to the deficit. I have a problem with adding to the deficit just to put more money in already well-off people’s pockets.
What about cuts to Medicaid and SNAP? I have a hard time finding the upside of this one. There is the fund that they put aside to support rural hospitals, so that will limit the damage hopefully, but there is currently a list of 338 rural hospitals that are likely to shut down because of the cuts to Medicaid.
As for the tax cuts, again, the majority of the benefit goes to those who are already well off. For example, if you make $36,000 a year, you’ll see a reduction in taxes of $100 to $150 in the first year. After that it goes back to what it was or maybe you pay a little more. If you make $75,000 a year you may save up to $800 in the first year. After that the savings disappear. Someone making $500,000 a year or more could save $15,000 to $30,000 a year and your savings don’t disappear. Maybe that’s all well and good, but…the non-partisan congressional budget office says it will add $3 to $4 trillion dollars to our deficit. That doesn’t seem good to me.
I have to run to some appointments, but when I’m back, I’ll be happy to look at other parts of the bill for you. And just one more thing – I find it interesting that being FOR small communities and farms is left leaning. I think it’s just about being for healthy communities. And I’d love to share some positive things about the bill because I agree, how could they pass something that is ONLY bad? So I will look more for how it helps rural communities when I get back.
Hey Tod,
I’ve done everything I can to find something good in this bill for the farmers and ranchers I work for. I have been unsuccessful. If my outlook seems negative, it’s because the bill is negative for them. The basic summary of the analysis, along with the parts of the bill I’ve read show that the OBBA helps multinational agribusinesses and factory farms, but for family farmers it’s mostly bad news. For them, there are cuts to conservation and local food programs, the safety is weakened, greater poser is consolidated in corporate hands, there is less access to rural USDA service and minimal investment in rural prosperity. But again, if you’re a big business, in corporate ag, you’ll have a different perspective and your conclusion would be that this is a great bill. If you’re asking, “But why would they do that?” well, I’m asking the same question and I just don’t have an answer.
Very good article! Decades ago, I was once told that there is politics in everything.
Your article has a good sound message.
Roy
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