Dave O’Brien is blunt about the toll of recent Trump administration policies on farmers.
“They’re choking us. We are getting choked out here,” he said. “This is not going to end well.”
O’Brien, who has grown corn and soybeans for 50 years in northern Illinois, has voted for both parties. But he is frustrated with the Republican Party in the Trump era. Since the U.S. began bombing Iran, restricted travel through the Strait of Hormuz has disrupted nitrogen fertilizer shipments, driving prices up — on top of rising fuel costs for farmers filling thousands of gallons of diesel.
“You and I go to the gas station, and we’re shocked when we got to spend $36 to fill our darn tank up,” he said. “Five-hundred gallons times $4 or $5 — there you go right there. It’s just crazy.”
Other Trump-era moves have also hurt producers. Deportations have thinned labor pools for some operations, tariffs raised the cost of machinery and strained ties with China, and a delayed meeting with the United States’ top soybean buyer helped send soybean prices down.
Former Agriculture Department chief economist Joseph Glauber says farm finances look weak. “If you just look at the cash side of the business, in terms of what they receive for their crops and what they have to pay out, those margins have been tight and in some cases negative,” he said.
The problems compound. Nitrogen is used on corn but not soybeans, so higher fertilizer costs make corn comparatively more expensive to grow. Market analysts estimate maybe a million to 1.5 million acres or more could shift from corn to soybeans, a switch that has helped push soybean prices lower.
Farming has always been unpredictable — weather, global politics and other shocks can upend markets — but domestic policy choices can amplify that volatility. In President Trump’s first term, tariffs prompted China to import more soybeans from South America instead of the U.S., a pattern that persists.
Trump has signaled he knows farmers are hurting, tweeting in all caps that Congress must “PASS THE FARM BILL, NOW.” Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins told NPR the administration is aware of planting-season challenges and “we are looking at every potential option to lower fertilizer prices.”
The Agriculture Department highlighted aid provided to farmers: a $12 billion program announced in December to support producers facing temporary trade disruptions and higher production costs, and more than $30 billion in direct federal aid to farmers last year. Glauber says that assistance helps but is not a permanent fix. “You got to think that providing 20, 30 billion dollars in additional money to the [agriculture] sector is not something that’s going to happen year in, year out,” he said.
Minnesota Farmers Union president Gary Wertish, who advised a former Minnesota governor on agriculture, sees the subsidies as political maneuvering. “It’s not right for the U.S. taxpayer to keep bailing the farmers out, which obviously the farmers need it now. But we need policies that don’t require bailouts,” he said. “We need policies that the farmers get their money from the marketplace and not from the U.S. taxpayer.”
David Oman, a former Iowa Republican Party co-chair, agrees that the payments have a political element. He and others say farmers most want certainty — stable policy and predictable markets so they can plan land purchases and major equipment investments. Persistent pain in the farm economy could also create political fallout for Republicans in the midterms, including in Iowa.
Trump has urged farmers to take the long view, framing tariffs as short-term pain for long-term gains. O’Brien rejects that logic. “It bothers me, these statements about, ‘Well, there’s going to be a little hurt to be spread around, but that’ll get better.’ I, quite frankly, don’t like that talk at all. Whether you’re talking about farmers or veterans, that’s almost an insult.”
He worries about the next generation of farmers — high land values and tight cash flows make it harder for young people to enter the business. “I can withstand all the pressure in the world but, man, these young guys,” he said. “I don’t know. It makes me nervous.”
O’Brien, a Vietnam veteran, is also anxious about the war with Iran. He sees the conflict through both a business and military lens. “It’s so frustrating, you know? And now you tell me, where is this war going to end up?” he said. “This to me, this just smells like Vietnam 2.0. I’m telling you, this is going to not end well.”
Whether the issue is Iran, tariffs, deportations or other policies, the pressing question for farmers is not just how these pressures will resolve but when.