One of the things that you see when you read Project 2025 is not just the racist dog whistles, but some ideas that were exactly lifted from some of the most extreme white supremacists ever.
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Department of Agriculture
about the importance of sound science to inform the USDA’s work and respect for personal freedom and individual dietary choices, private property rights, and the rule of law.
Taking these factors into account, below is a model USDA mission statement:
To develop and disseminate agricultural information and research, identify and address concrete public health and safety threats directly connected to food and agriculture, and remove both unjustified foreign trade barriers for U.S. goods and domestic government barriers that undermine access to safe and affordable food absent a compelling need—all based on the importance of sound science, personal freedom, private property, the rule of law, and service to all Americans.
OVERVIEW
In 1862, President Abraham Lincoln signed into law the legislation that created the USDA.* The department had a very narrow mission focused on the dissemination of information connected to agriculture and “to procure, propagate and distribute among the people new valuable seeds and plants.”® During the last 160 years, the scope of the USDA’s work has expanded well beyond that narrow mission—and well beyond agriculture itself. In addition to being a distributor of farm subsidies, the USDA runs the food stamp program and other food-related welfare programs and covers issues including conservation, biofuels, forestry, and rural programs.
Based on the USDA’s fiscal year (FY) 2023 budget summary, outlays are estimated at $261 billion: $221 billion for mandatory programs and $39 billion for discretionary programs.° These outlays are broken down as follows: nutrition assistance (70 percent); farm, conservation, and commodity programs (14 percent); “all other,” which includes rural development, research, food safety, marketing and regulatory, and departmental management (11 percent); and forestry (5 percent).”
The USDA has provided a summary of its size, explaining, “Today, USDA is comprised of 29 agencies organized under eight Mission Areas and 16 Staff Offices, with nearly 100,000 employees serving the American people at more than 6,000 locations across the country and abroad.”8
MAJOR PRIORITY ISSUES AND SPECIFIC RECOMMENDATIONS
For an incoming Administration, there are numerous issues that should be addressed at the USDA. This chapter identifies and discusses many of the most important issues. The initial issues discussed should be priority issues for the next Administration:
Defend American Agriculture. It is deeply unfortunate that the first issue identified must be a willingness of the incoming Administration to defend American agriculture, but this is precisely what the top priority for that Administration