Tens of thousands of farmers and farmer-serving organizations have been thrown into limbo by an unprecedented freeze on federal payments that were under signed, lawful contracts. On January 27, 2025, farmers and farm advocates received news that the Trump administration would be hitting pause on all federal funding in response to Executive Orders signed on January 20. Farmers, ranchers and the entire fabric of the farming community rely on this funding.
The executive orders include freezing Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) spending – a bipartisan infrastructure and climate bill passed by Congress in 2022 that funds a number of conservation programs farmers count on, including Regional Energy for America Program (REAP), Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP), Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP), Regional Conservation Partnerships (RCP) and Agricultural Conservation Easement Program (ACEP). Pausing these programs – many midway through contracts already in motion – hurts farmers and ranchers and erodes trust in the federal government.
The situation has continued to evolve every day since that first executive order, with multiple court cases moving through the judicial system, putting temporary restraining orders in place. It remains unclear if the administration will abide by these court orders. As of now, funding remains frozen, except for the tiniest sliver that has been released as of last week. Even if all funding is eventually released, the administration’s mass firing of federal employees will undoubtedly hinder or delay its dispersal.
Here is a brief timeline of this developing situation
- On February 3, the courts put forth a temporary restraining order blocking the withholding of funds for any programs related to climate change or diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives.
- On February 21, a judge temporarily paused actions banning DEI work, arguing that the underlying executive order likely violates the First Amendment.
- As of February 26, another executive order was signed halting all government payments except those to individuals. Though this may seem like a win for farmers as individuals, it is not, as many of the payments they rely on come to them through organizations working on the ground who are subject to the executive order.
Farm Aid spoke to organizations and farmers on the frontlines of this funding freeze to hear how it’s impacting them and their communities.
Note: As of February 25, 2025, Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins announced the release of $20 million in frozen IRA-funded farmer contracts. While important, this amount is only a fraction (0.35%) of the full two billion dollars of obligated funding across NRCS. Furthermore, it remains unclear which farmers will benefit from this limited release of funds.
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How is the freeze impacting farmers?
Brian Geier, Bundle Sticks Farm, Harrison County, IN
Brian Geier farms 55 acres of corn, soy and hay, and maintains ten acres of forest in Harrison County, Indiana. In recent years he’s added sheep and agroforestry as well. He gets federal funding through an EQIP contract with the USDA to help with invasive species removal, which is important to the health of the forests and the success of his forestry operation. He also has a contract with NRCS to start rotational grazing on his farm this upcoming season.
Though he hasn’t started the rotational grazing component of the project, he’s already spent money preparing for the design and expanding his herd. If NRCS doesn’t continue his contract, Brian fears that he will be in the hole for money he has already spent: “I’m still figuring out what this means for us, but the most immediate effect is that the process for forming agreements with the USDA now feels uncertain. Not knowing whether or not contracts will be honored, or turned on and off suddenly – to say it causes uncertainty and stress for farmers utilizing federal support programs is putting it mildly.”
In Indiana alone, farmers have nearly $26 million dollars in active, legal contracts with the federal government that are currently being withheld; with $5 million on hold in Indiana’s 9th District where Brian resides. He says that freezing conservation funds mid-stride hurts not only farmers, but also the wider farming community like contractors who are working on farm projects: “The money is basically passing through farmers’ hands and going to people who we (farmers) have lined up to pay for conservation work. It’s going to people who produce cover crop seed, it’s going to the native seed industry, it’s going to the native plant industry, it’s going to local contractors who are excavators digging water lines and people building fences. Money for conservation programs definitely has a multiplier effect.”
Brian has reached out to his legislators and is frustrated by their lack of a substantive response. “To date, to my knowledge, Indiana’s senators and our district’s representatives have not said a word. A lot of folks I am talking to are telling me to ‘wait it out,’” he says. “It is past time Hoosiers and our legislators stand up for farmers who have legal contracts with the USDA.”
Overall, Brian wants the public to know that the nature of farming makes this freeze particularly untenable: “I can’t start and stop nature or a farming season just because [President] Trump and Elon [Musk] want to review our signed agreements from two years ago,” says Brian. “I can’t take the risk of buying a bunch of fencing or hiring the excavator for the water line without knowing that we’ll get the cost-share payment for it. And I certainly can’t stop the sheep from having the babies they are bred to have this spring because the fence won’t be there because now I can’t buy it. And here’s a real kicker: If we don’t follow through with this year’s activities in the contract, technically we would owe the money we got from [the government] last year back.”
John Bartman selling sweet corn, an annual tradition in Marengo since 1964.
John Bartman, Bartman Family Farm, Marengo, Illinois
John Bartman runs a 900-acre regenerative vegetable and grain farm in Marengo, IL, and sells his produce at a roadside stand outside of Chicago. He is no stranger to the demands of agriculture, as his family has been farming in the Midwest since 1846.
Though John has been farming with cover crops and practicing no-till for years, he never qualified for funding under the NRCS’s narrow guidelines. That changed in 2023 when the IRA was passed, providing funding for Climate Smart Commodities Partnerships programs. These initiatives pay farmers for implementing practices like planting cover crops or reducing fertilizer usage. Employing a contract with this program, John entered a public-private partnership with a company to buy his grain and market it as sustainable. Prior to the IRA, these types of conservation programs didn’t pay well and weren’t worth the time. Now he earns fifty-five dollars an acre for planting cover crops and is paid for nutrient management studies that help prevent runoff.
The view from John’s cab while he plants a cereal rye cover crop to prevent soil erosion, use less fertilizer and increase wildlife habitats.
John got a notice in January that everything was on hold, and was told not to expect the program to continue. John was at a loss. “We’re counting on that money. We sequestered the carbon, we did the job. It’s just not right, it’s a contract! It’s an invoice and a bill and they should honor that program. We sat down with our banker last year and we figured it out; this was a way for us to keep our head above water.”
John is disappointed that the government broke its contract with him. “We shouldn’t be waiting for this. This is our money. We’ve signed a contract. I’m very, very disheartened right now. ”
Photo: John Bartman
Jesse Womack, Policy Specialist at National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (NSAC)
NSAC’s Jesse Womack explains the impacts of the funding freeze are two-fold. The first is that “existing contracts with farmers won’t be paid out,” and the second is “unobligated funds in USDA coffers will be held there, even those funds slotted for wildly popular programs with long backlogs of farmers.”
“Breaking a contract for politics is deplorable, but we’ve seen evidence that that’s what’s happening. USDA must honor all existing contracts in IRA-funded programs and Congress must make sure they do.” – Jesse Womack
Jesse notes that government delays in dispersing IRA money, along with foregoing new contracts will leave many farmers stuck in limbo. These are farmers who have been preparing and expecting to get funded. The conservation programs that are funded through the IRA are chronically oversubscribed and underfunded. If these funds go away completely, farmers who are trying to build more resilient operations will be left in the cold.
Many farmers already have signed contracts under these programs and many projects are underway like installing fencing, planting cover crops and installing irrigation. If the administration proceeds to break these contracts, they are putting farmers at huge financial risk. “You can’t just leave that bill on someone’s lap,” says Jesse. “Breaking a contract for politics is deplorable, but we’ve seen evidence that that’s what’s happening. USDA must honor all existing contracts in IRA-funded programs and Congress must make sure they do.”
Jesse is frustrated that the administration scrubbed any mention of climate change from the USDA’s website. “It’s sad to see when farmers across the country are dealing with climate change every single day and the impacts it has directly on their operations are undeniable. Politicians can’t hide the fact that good stewardship and soil health practices mitigate the effects of climate change.”
Hannah Smith-Brubaker, Executive Director, Pasa Sustainable Agriculture
Hannah Smith-Brubaker is a livestock farmer and Executive Director of Pasa Sustainable Agriculture, an organization in Pennsylvania that supports sustainable farming through farmer-driven research and education.
Oftentimes, farmers receive government funds through organizations–organizations like Pasa. Pasa takes part in the Partnerships for Climate-Smart Commodities program, using it to provide direct technical assistance and incentives to help farmers cover the costs of conservation practices. They currently have 143 farms enrolled and nearly two million dollars already committed to farmer support across 238 counties and 15 states in the Mid-Atlantic and New England regions. With more than three years remaining on the grant, the funding freeze threatens Pasa’s ability to distribute the remaining $22 million designated for farmers in the region – a feat they were on track to accomplish.
“There is no justification for cutting or scrubbing a program based solely on its name when its benefits are tangible, measurable and essential to sustaining both farms and communities.” – Hannah Smith-Brubaker
Practices like cover cropping, prescribed grazing and crop rotation are time and cost-intensive, yet they are critical for protecting soil health, improving water quality and mitigating the impacts of extreme flooding. However, because such efforts happen at the farm level and are not necessarily seen in the end product, such efforts tend not to yield market premiums, making financial support crucial. Hannah explains “this program is essential because it helps farmers implement resilient stewardship practices in a holistic way. The incentive payments we provide empower farmers to adopt and sustain conservation practices, ensuring long-term environmental and economic resilience while safeguarding vital natural resources.”
She goes on to explain how there is “already a major gap in technical support provision through USDA NRCS and, with the recent layoffs, this is only getting worse. Part of the aim of this project was to grow the next generation of Technical Support Providers, themselves becoming excellent candidates for future NRCS positions.”
If this funding is cut, Hannah predicts it will directly impact farmers’ bottom lines by eliminating a critical source of income they rely on. Many will no longer be able to implement the conservation practices that Pasa supports, resulting in a loss of environmental benefits for surrounding communities. Reduced stewardship will leave farms more vulnerable to extreme weather events like flooding and drought, which have been intensifying in recent growing seasons. Ultimately, these challenges will drive up production costs, which will be passed on to consumers in the form of higher food prices, further straining local and regional food systems.
Hannah guesses that the use of climate change in the program’s name has targeted it for cuts. “What matters most is that our programs protect soil health, improve watersheds and enhance farm productivity; outcomes we can all agree on,” she notes. “There is no justification for cutting or scrubbing a program based solely on its name when its benefits are tangible, measurable and essential to sustaining both farms and communities.”
Learn more about Pasa and the federal funding freeze here.
David Wallace. Photo: Appalachian Sustainable Development
Appalachian Sustainable Development
Appalachian Sustainable Development (ASD) is a nonprofit organization in Virginia that works on food access, agriculture education, workforce and economic development and resource management. ASD’s model of helping farmers adopt agroforestry is holistic and gives farmers a leg up on starting their business until it’s self-sustaining. But such programs require government support. In February, ASD learned that their three federal grants – totaling $1.25 million dollars across five states – were impacted by the federal funding freeze. These federal grants enabled ASD’s Agroforestry Program to provide essential resources and services to farming communities throughout Central Appalachia, including on-farm and virtual agroforestry technical assistance, financial assistance to offset agroforestry establishment costs, processing and sales support, and much more.
With federal funding frozen, these critical services and their agroforestry team are in jeopardy. For example, farmers across the U.S. risk losing $60 million dollars in direct financial assistance for the establishment of agroforestry practices that are key to diversifying farm income, increasing yields and improving resilience to floods and droughts.
“These federal grants are largely reimbursement-based, meaning ASD and farmers must spend the money before the government issues payment. With a freeze in effect, these payments cannot be made and we have no information on how long it will take before our grant accounts are unlocked,” says Katie Commender, ASD’s Director of Agroforestry.
David Wallace is a third generation farmer who has worked with ASD since 2018 to diversify his family cattle farm’s income with production of specialty crops. When asked how the federal funding freeze impacts his farm, David said, “It would be devastating to say the least. I would not be able to diversify our income, and would also not be able to employ people to help with the harvesting. The agroforestry and herb hub are essential to Reeds Valley Farm’s success. Without these programs our farm would not be the farm it is today. People in our community would be worse off, with no extra income to support their families. ASD’s agroforestry program is essential to this community and Reeds Valley Farms.”
Sylvia Crum, ASD’s Director of Development, explains that farmers apply for funding and go through competitive review before being chosen for awards. Many of these farmers have started planning their projects and have contractors that need to get paid and trees that need to go in the ground this spring. In addition, all of ASD’s sales, processing and distribution services are currently at risk, totalling over $237,000 in potential sales loss for farmers this year alone. Slyvia worries, “In terms of the economic impact that this is having on farmers, it’s certainly a big one.”
Photo: Appalachian Sustainable Development
Conclusion
These stories of farmers and farmer-serving organizations losing federal funding are only a few of the thousands from around the country. USDA’s withholding of payments owed under signed, lawful contracts is causing turmoil across our food system. Without intervention from Congress, the effects of the freeze are likely to compound and severely impact all aspects of our food system – from seed and soil, to farmer and consumer.
