Daryl Royal, the 20-year University of Texas football coach, once said, “You've gotta dance with them that brung ya.” The modern adaptation of that quote is “you gotta dance with the one who brought you to the party.” The expression means you should remain loyal to the people or things that helped you succeed.
Sixty-three percent of America’s 3,144 counties are predominantly rural, and Donald Trump won 93 percent of those counties in 2024. Analyses show that rural counties have become increasingly solid Republican, and Trump’s margin of victory within rural America reached a new high in the 2024 election.
We are at the 260th day of Trump’s 2.0 presidency. Polling by ActiVote reveals that Mr. Trump’s approval rating is rapidly declining with rural Americans (Newsweek, Sept. 5).
Let’s explore why these 2024 election supporters are not happy with Trump’s performance to date.
America’s global agriculture market
Historians note that Presidents Franklin D. Roosevelt (Dem.) and Richard Nixon (Rep.) were the backbone to make the U.S. the global agriculture market leader. Evidence is replete that America’s worldwide agribusiness sector prowess has been evaporating at a quick pace since Trump’s Jan. 20 inauguration (Brennan Center for Justice, Aug. 3).
Economic and agricultural harm
The trade wars initiated by Mr. Trump have devastated export markets for American products like soybeans, corn, wheat, sorghum, cotton, pork, dairy, and beef. For example, China, a top buyer of U.S. soybeans, retaliated against Trump by shifting its purchasing to Brazil and Argentina.
In retaliation to Trump’s tariffs, five countries (China, Canada, Mexico, Turkey, and Russia) and the 27-member European Union have imposed their own levies, causing higher prices on equipment, steel and fertilizer needed by farmers (Tax Foundation, Sept. 26). The trade retaliation will continue to harm small and medium-sized family farms and is already trickling down to all of America.
Trump’s heightened immigration enforcement has led to raids on farms and processing plants, causing severe labor shortages in the agricultural labor sector. It’s sad that the Trump administration is not aware that of the 2.4 million farm workers nationwide, about 1.2 million are undocumented, who help plant, tend, harvest, pack, sort, and prepare food-related products Americans depend upon (CBS News and https://farmonaut.com).
USDA’s faux pas
Withholding USDA funding has created severe financial, operational, and rural community impacts, forcing many farmers into economic distress, threatening farm viability, and damaging rural economies (NRDC, Sept. 10).
USDA payment freezes and staffing cuts have stalled irrigation and rural housing projects, which have extended hardship beyond the farm into rural-based communities.
When the USDA reneged on signed contracts, most farmers lost their trust in USDA partnerships and government commitments (ibid).
Rural health and safety
The Trump 2.0 administration’s cuts to rural health and telehealth programs have put healthcare access at risk for the 64 million people who live in the nation's rural areas.
Trump’s effort to repeal or weaken the Affordable Care Act will disproportionately cause rural Americans—who rely heavily on Medicaid or individual markets—to lose insurance.
Budget reductions of opioid and substance abuse response programs—an acute problem in rural America—will have a devastating impact.
Erosion of community infrastructure
Mr. Trump’s reduced support for clean water infrastructure will directly affect rural public health. Similarly, reducing investments in rural broadband will put rural America further behind its urban and suburban peers.
Trump has imposed less funding for rural roads, bridges, and transit, which will impede economic growth and public safety.
Rural households—who spend around 40 percent more on utilities as a share of their income—will face greater hardship as a result of the Trump administration eliminating not only the low-income home energy assistance program but by reducing the weatherization assistance program.
Social safety nets
President Trump’s cuts to the SNAP program will dramatically make it worse for 9.8 million rural-based school children, as their food insecurity rates are the highest in America (Feeding America, May 14).
These examples collectively illustrate how Trump’s 2.0 actions—in only 260 days—have directly worsened living conditions in rural America by reducing access to essential services, increasing financial insecurity, declining healthcare, eroding community infrastructure, and increasing food insecurity for 9.8 million school children.
Trump’s actions are a slap in the face to about two-thirds of Americans who reside in a rural county, where 93 percent of them danced with him in the 2024 election. More broadly, Trump’s actions affect all Americans, as everyone depends on ag products to exist.
This begs the question: when will our 535 Congressional delegates – regardless of their political persuasion – wake up to the economic mess Donald Trump and his cabinet acolytes have created and take action to save America from further domestic and international ruin? Without Congressional intervention, the next 1,200 days of Trump 2.0 are going to be quite cloudy and murky.
Samantha Shepherd, a child care director in Savannah, Georgia, and a single mom of two girls, said rising gas prices are affecting families at her center, including one mother who may not be able to take her children to school. (Courtesy of Samantha Shepherd)
