Various organizations supporting the MAHA movement have written a letter to USDA’s Secretary Brooke Rollins, imploring her to adopt policies that support organic and regenerative farming to restore soil and food quality and boost struggling small farms nationwide. The letter is accompanied by a grassroots petition that all Americans are invited to sign.
The letter seeks to help HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. shore up Republicans’ left flank and win the 2026 midterms. Its title reads, “Tell Secretary Rollins to Protect Farmer Livelihoods and Promote Healthy Food to End Chronic Disease in America.”
The solution to America’s food supply crisis includes support for small, local farmers and their products for local schools, hospitals, and needy citizens. Republican voters are often rural voters: helping small farms while improving the health of all Americans is a win-win political and social policy.
Secretary Rollins has helped large crop farmers. Donald Trump has pledged tariff receipts to soy farmers who have been crushed by China’s boycott of their crops. Yet many programs and funding for the nation’s essential small family and organic farms have been slashed. It is economically and politically imperative that the administration provide immediate support to local, regenerative agriculture.
The letter and petition both prioritize policy initiatives that the USDA can implement unilaterally to deliver much-needed economic relief to small farms while providing health-building, whole foods to all Americans. Fresh, whole foods help children learn, aid patients in hospitals, and promote greater health for all Americans.
The letter reads, in part:
If we want healthy families, thriving rural communities, and a secure nation, we must enact policies that respect farmers as stewards of the land and ensure that taxpayer dollars support the farmers and ranchers who feed our communities.
We urge you to take swift, decisive action to rebuild the foundation of America’s food system—restoring soil health, strengthening local markets, and ensuring every child has access to fresh, healthy food…. These are not partisan goals—they are common-sense, pro-health, pro-family, and pro-farmer values shared across the political spectrum.
The letter then offers a detailed prescription to implement seven key policy areas to bolster farms and food supplies:
- Urges the USDA to allocate a larger portion of its $5 billion commodity procurement budget to “independent producers offering organic foods and pasture-based, humanely raised meat that is free from antibiotics and growth-promoting drugs” to provide healthier options to schools and federal nutrition programs while supporting local farmers.
- Argues to restore local procurement funding, especially of the Local Food for Schools and Child Care program and the Local Food Purchase Assistance program, and reinstate the Regional Food Business Centers that supported small and mid-sized meat producers and regenerative farmers to deliver healthy foods to local markets. Many small farms depended on these programs.
- Cites the MAHA Commission Report, and encourages support for “a shift away from ultra-processed foods in schools to scratch cooking with whole ingredients by expanding funding for kitchen equipment, technical assistance, and culinary training for school food professionals.”
- Petitions the USDA to increase technical assistance to support farms transitioning to organic or regenerative systems, bolster the National Organic Program, and provide emergency assistance to struggling organic dairy farms.
- Requests an increase in staffing of the Natural Resource Conservation Service, reinstating canceled conservation projects, and training Technical Service Providers “to help farmers cut chemical costs and rebuild soil fertility through regenerative and organic practices.”
- Calls for reform of the national Checkoff program to avoid diversion of funds to industrial lobbyists and ensure they benefit all farmers. Currently, check-off dollars are being used to implement pesticide liability shield laws that protect chemical companies at the expense of human health.
- Appeals to the USDA not to favor large commodity crop producers at the expense of fruit, vegetable, organic, and regenerative farmers.
A growing list of signatories includes Mom’s Across America’s founding executive director, Zen Honeycutt; United We Eat founder David Murphy; Farm Action President Angela Huffman; and other leading food and farming advocacy voices.
Angela Huffman emphasized the bipartisan thrust of the effort: “We’re working with partners across the country to urge USDA to stand with the farmers growing healthy food for our communities—not Big Ag.”
David Murphy, founder of United We Eat, adds:
With the harmful impacts of decades of industry consolidation, soaring input costs, and recent cuts to important USDA programs, America’s best farmers are being pushed to the brink of economic extinction… If we want to grow real food that helps end chronic disease and make Americans healthy again, we need to invest in long-term strategies that support a transition to organic and regenerative farming practices that boost soil health, lower chemical exposures, and produce more nutrient-rich foods.
As a farmer and food rights activist, I was pleased to join in this appeal. If you support these improvements to our nation’s food supply and operate a farm, please sign the letter. If you are not a farmer, please sign the petition. Let’s urge the USDA to adopt these vital recommendations to support America’s small farms and improve the quality of our food supplies for future generations.
Author, pastor, and attorney John Klar raises grass-fed beef and sheep in Vermont. His Substack, Small Farm Republic, is based on his 2023 book, Small Farm Republic: Why Conservatives Must Embrace Local Agriculture, Reject Climate Alarmism, and Lead an Environmental Revival. John is a staff writer at Liberty Nation News.
Image: Public domain.