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USDA REPORTS IT HAS MADE $6 BILLION PAYMENTS TO CROP PRODUCERS
Mar. 9, 2026
POLITICO reports:
Washington, DC -- USDA Deputy Secretary Stephen Vaden said more than $6 billion in economic aid payments have been made so far to row crop farmers, who were allotted $11 billion in the Trump administration's farmer bridge program.
He said USDA is still determining payment rates for the $1 billion reserved for specialty crop and sugar farmers.
"I suspect that we will have those payment rates by the end of this month or, at the latest, very early April," Vaden said on the "AG Bull Media" podcast Saturday. "Once we have those payment rates, we will publish them ... and then march forth with the payment part of it."
Higher tariffs? Vaden said the tariff rate on sugar products isn't high enough to help American domestic sugar producers.
"The tariff level for sugar imports has not been changed in more than a decade," Vaden said. "That tariff is no longer high enough to discourage the importation of cheap, subsidized foreign sugar to compete with American sugar producers."
He added that he hopes the administration will "study and perhaps raise those base level tariff amounts."
Sugar beet, cotton and rice are the commodities "in the most financial distress" because of their high costs of production and trade issues, Vaden said.
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