Remember how former Attorney General Jeff Sessions recused himself from managing Special Counsel Robert Mueller investigation? Then, he went on to do Donald Trump’s bidding with very few exceptions. It appears that the sitting Attorney General is even worse. This time, the president’s voters have paid the price
It seems, the commander-in-chief diverted $62.4 million meant for American farmers to a corrupt Brazilian meat-packing company. Trump set aside millions of dollars to help farmers on the verge of bankruptcy caused by his own ill-considered tariffs on China. He ruined American farmers’ markets, and many of them may lose 4th and 5th generation land.
The Department of Agriculture sent the money in three payments to the largest meat-packing company in the world JBS, which is owned by two corrupt Brazilian brothers. The administration sent out the last $14.5 installment this month. Ths huge meatpacking company has a subsidiary based in Colorado.
The farm trade group R-CALF sent a letter to then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions, then- Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue, and Trump in June 2017. The farmers demanded the Department of Justice (DOJ) investigate JBS for “corrupt business practices in the U.S.,” according to The Daily News:
‘From unlawfully securing loans to abusing pension funds to selling tainted beef to bribing government officials to violating Amazon rainforest protection laws to insider trading, the list of inexcusable conduct that JBS allegedly committed is incomprehensible.’
After Trump upped his tariffs on China from 10 percent to 25 percent in his trade war, China retaliated. It placed levies on American exporters including “American farmers of soybeans and other crops.” Without the federal bailout, the country will tragically lose some of the last family farmers.
The letter continued:
‘The fact that JBS was allowed to build its political and economic monopoly in the United States with impunity raises the specter that decisions regarding JBS, at nearly every level of government, were based on inappropriate considerations.’
Lobbyist at Food & Water Watch Tony Corbo said that the huge meat company’s income for just the first quarter in 2019 was $273 million:
‘Why is the USDA bailing out plants operated by JBS, the largest meatpacker in the world, with a program designed to help domestic companies and producers under economic duress? his company does not seem to be hurting.’
Corbo continued, supporting Trump:
‘Our great Patriot Farmers will be one of the biggest beneficiaries of what is happening now. The Farmers have been ‘forgotten’ for many years. Their time is now!’
Representative Rosa DeLauro (D-CT) introduced a bill to restrict Trump’s administration’s bailouts to U.S.-owned companies earlier this year. In it, she would also require the Department of Agriculture to release its justification for its bailouts to “large multi-national corporations.” She said:
‘It is clear the president is not the least bit knowledgeable about trade policy, nor aware of the chaos his failed approach has caused. We now know that tens of millions of these dollars went to large, multinational corporations — including Brazilian-owned JBS — who are racking up profits while family farmers face collapse. That is outrageous. Their incompetence and lack of transparency has shown that they cannot be trusted to get this right.
Featured image is a screenshot via YouTube.
