American Farmers Are Feeling the Pain of Trump’s Policies
US agricultural communities that had expected Trump to have their backs have found themselves flung into a second trade war. If the situation continues, it could put loyalties at risk.
Randy Roecker in Wisconsin was forced to sell his farm in June because of high debt.
Photographer: David Nevala for Bloomberg Businessweek
Jeff Winton was on a national radio tour this spring raising awareness about US farmers’ declining mental health when he had a startling realization. As he described to a series of radio hosts from Iowa to Texas the sense of isolation and despondency increasingly affecting the agricultural workforce, he noticed with a jolt that he was describing himself.
Winton is the founder of Rural Minds, a not-for-profit group connecting Americans living outside big cities to local mental health resources. He also runs a dairy farm in New York’s Chautauqua County. He’s been overcome by worries about how President Donald Trump’s tariffs would hurt his 100-cow operation, as well as the rural peers he works with every day. “I was feeling very angry. I was feeling very depressed. I was feeling very pessimistic. I just couldn’t believe that we were doing these things to the people that I advocate for,” Winton, 67, says. He’d spent years directing other struggling farmers into care after his 28-year-old nephew died by suicide near the family farm in 2012. So Winton decided in May to start seeing a therapist himself for the first time.