Wednesday was a difficult day for The American Independent News Network, which is the larger entity that operates The Iowa Independent. Our chief executive and founder announced two of our sister sites would close and their content would be moved to The American Independent.
A recently introduced bill could have far-reaching impact on the U.S. sugar industry, including American Crystal Sugar, a farmer-owned cooperative that locked out 1,300 Midwest workers on Aug. 1.
The chairman for Herman Cain’s Iowa effort says the campaign “relied more on the word of farmers than Washington regulators” in deciding to run an ad containing claims the Environmental Protection Agency says are false.
The Iowa Senate will remain under the control of a slim 26-25 Democratic majority when it reconvenes in January 2012.
Americans should be outraged that the Senate approved $1.15 billion to resolve racial bias claims brought by black farmers against the U.S. Department of Agriculture, since it sends the message that “if you’re a minority, you deserve a check from the government,” U.S. Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) said Monday.
The money in question was passed by unanimous consent in the Senate and sent it to the House, which has passed similar legislation twice before. The black farmers’ case is an outgrowth of Pigford v. Glickman, a federal class-action lawsuit originally settled in 1999. The farmers alleged that the USDA had violated the Equal Credit Opportunity Act and the Administrative Procedure Act by maintaining a pattern and practice of discrimination against African American farmers. Such pattern and practice delayed, denied, or otherwise frustrated the efforts of African American farmers to obtain loan assistance and to engage in the vocation of farming.
The Obama administration agreed in February to provide a second round of damages to people who were denied earlier payment because they had missed the deadlines for filing. The person who pushed to allow more black farmers to join the case and for more money to be set aside for settlements was Iowa’s own U.S. Sen. Chuck Grassley. In a February press release, Grassley noted that “many people were shut out of the process.”
King said in an interview with WHO-AM’s Jan Mickelson that his hope is to find ways to defund the settlement when Republicans take over Congress in January, “ but it’s looking difficult now.” The bill is expected to pass the House before Thanksgiving.
“This lame-duck session is going to be characterized by the spitefulness of the left as they go out the door flailing away at the American taxpayers and the workers of America, and driving wedges between people in this country, identified a lot by skin color and race,” King said.
The Obama administration is “focused on race,” King said, and most lawmakers are hesitant to speak out on such a delicate matter. Essentially, the entire lawsuit was pitched to black farmers as their “40 acres and a mule,” King said, referencing the Civil War era practice of providing land to former slaves who became free as Union armies occupied areas of the Confederacy.
“There’s already been more than a billion dollars paid out, I believe many, in fact most of them that received it never farmed, never were discriminated against,” King said. “They were ginned up and recruited to file these claims by a group of lawyers who jumped on this thing and drove it. No one wanted to say ‘no’ because the race issue was in the middle of it. So the taxpayers are taking the brunt of this.”
In a statement from the Senate floor last week, Grassley said changes have been made to the settlement agreement to enhance the government’s ability to fight fraud. He praised the passage of the funding, saying “we have the opportunity to make right these past wrongs by the Department and give each individual claimant the right to tell their side of the story.”
“The Department of Agriculture has admitted that discrimination occurred,” Grassley said. “We are obligated to do our best in getting those who deserve it, some relief. This is a chance for people who believe they were wronged to show their case before a neutral party and have it judged on the merits. It’s time to give justice to these claimants who were previously left out, and move forward into a new era of civil rights at the Department of Agriculture.”
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