Farmers and ranchers wake up every day with one goal in mind: to feed America. Their jobs require hard work. And while that should be the main requirement to be a farmer, Congress has instead prioritized the skin color and sex of farmers when it comes to many of the programs and benefits the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) offers them.
For years now, at Congress’s direction, USDA has given more benefits to farmers who are “socially disadvantaged” and fewer benefits to farmers who are white men. Discrimination on the basis of race and sex is plainly unconstitutional, which is why Southeastern Legal Foundation (SLF) has stepped in with a lawsuit to hold the government accountable and stop it from discriminating.
SLF filed the lawsuit in federal court on behalf of Texas Farm Bureau and two white male farmers who would be eligible for USDA benefits if they were of another race or sex.
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The plaintiffs are challenging two unconstitutional programs: the Noninsured Crop Disaster Assistance Program (NAP) and the Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP). NAP provides assistance to farmers who suffer crop losses due to disasters, but only if they are “socially disadvantaged”—meaning women, American Indians or Alaskan Natives, Asians or Asian-Americans, blacks or African-Americans, Hispanics or Hispanic-Americans, and Native Hawaiians or other Pacific Islanders—or if they meet other criteria like being below the poverty line or veterans. EQIP provides grants to farmers to help improve agriculture and the environment through upgrades to their land, but with similar “socially disadvantaged” parameters: farmers must be black or African-American, Hispanic or Hispanic-American, and Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander to be eligible for a grant.
These are just two of dozens of unconstitutional programs USDA has rolled out over the decades. While SLF successfully beat back eight Biden-era programs in court, and applauds the Trump Administration’s efforts to roll back more unconstitutional programs, the work is not done as some programs remain on the books.
The government’s overt and unconstitutional racial and sex-based discrimination cannot stand. There is no room for discrimination in America today, and that is why SLF is holding the federal government accountable in court.