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agriculture
Talarico Calls on Trump USDA to 'Fully Staff' Agency to Confront Flesh-Eating Parasite Found in Texas Cattle
A key pest control office "lost 1,300 employees due to cuts and firings" said one public health expert. "That’s the thing about prevention: You don’t notice it when it works, only when it is gone."
Jun 04, 2026
Democratic US Senate candidate James Talarico called on the Trump administration to reverse the massive job cuts at the US Department of Agriculture—some of the largest that were imposed last year as President Donald Trump and his then-adviser Elon Musk embarked on a "slash-and-burn exercise" to reduce the government workforce—as the agency announced Wednesday that it had detected the country's first case of New World screwworm since 1966.
The parasitic fly was found in a three-week-old calf in La Pryor, Texas, after months of warnings from Texas agricultural officials and the state's $15 billion cattle industry that the flesh-eating pest, whose larvae exclusively feed on the living tissue of warm-blooded animals, could soon make its way to the US after spreading through Latin America in recent years. Mexico reported its first case in 2024 and saw a 53% increase in the number of cases in animals between July-August 2025.
"Following a historic drought that has reduced our herd size and driven up prices," said Talarico late Wednesday, "the New World screwworm outbreak is further disrupting supply chains that impact all of us who rely on the cattle industry—from meatpacking facilities to feedlots to grocery stores."
"We must fully staff the USDA so that the federal government can provide clear and predictable guidance for ranchers and work alongside the Texas government and the cattle industry to keep pests like the New World screwworm out of our herd," said Talarico.
Catharine Young, a senior fellow at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, noted that the USDA's Animal and Plant Health Prevention Service "helps prevent threats like screwworm from ever reaching US livestock."
"In 2025, it lost 1,300 employees due to cuts and firings," said Young. "That’s the thing about prevention: You don’t notice it when it works, only when it is gone."
The Department of Government Efficiency also cut funding that supported outbreak investigations, response efforts, and testing laboratories in 22 countries and helped build laboratories for testing.
The parasite does not pose a food safety threat, according to officials. A top concern is that an outbreak could raise beef prices—which have already been driven up by the fact that the US cattle herd is the smallest it's been in 75 years following years of drought conditions, the surging costs associated with ranching, and corporate consolidation.
The USDA estimates that an outbreak could cost Texas' economy $1.8 billion in losses before it is contained.
The pest can infect humans—and 41 human cases were reported in Mexico last year—but experts say such cases are rare and that the detection of screwworm in Texas poses little risk to the public.
Instead of spreading from animal to animal, screwworm females lay eggs in animals' open wounds. The larvae then burrow into living flesh and feed on tissue, causing severe infections and death if the livestock goes untreated.
For decades, agricultural officials deployed a technique that successfully eradicated screwworm in the US: releasing sterilized male flies into affected areas. Female flies generally only mate once in their lifespan, so those that mate with a sterile male produce no offspring.
The USDA has begun releasing sterile flies into the part of South Texas where the parasite was found and is investing in sterile fly production facilities in the state. It has also established a 12-mile quarantine zone around the affected area.
US officials are also reportedly working with Mexico and Panama to use the sterile fly technique in those countries.
Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins said Wednesday that US has deployed 8,000 traps capable of detecting screwworm, and blamed the case in South Texas on "the open-border policies of the last administration and the resulting illicit cattle movement."
Rollins had denied screwworm was in the United States a day before she confirmed the case at a press conference on Wednesday.
Experts believe pandemic-era disruptions to sterile fly programs, increased movement of livestock and people, and weather conditions that have allowed the parasite to thrive may all have contributed to the screwworm's gradual journey toward the US.
Texas Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller said Wednesday that "for months, the screwworm has advanced rapidly through Mexico in spite of the USDA’s existing gameplan," and called on the Trump administration to approve the deployment of the Screwworm Adult Suppression System, which uses bait and insecticides and was tested by the US in the 1970s to eradicate the parasite.
“We have the ability to shut that and eradicate that screwworm," Miller told The Texas Tribune. "We can do it in about 60 days. USDA has the tools and the knowledge to do it.”
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It's Time for a Progressive Policy to Protect Agricultural Supply Chains
Price floors and supply management programs seem common sense to policymakers when it comes to oil and minerals, but what about US farmers and our overall food system?
Jun 03, 2026
The race to obtain critical minerals and the war in Iran have not only exposed a dangerous dependence on fossil fuels and mining, but they have also uncovered something more surprising—Republicans in Congress actually understand progressive agriculture policy. They just don’t want to admit it.
In February, Vice President JD Vance announced at the State Department that the administration must institute a price floor to protect the US critical mineral market. “This morning, the Trump administration is proposing a concrete mechanism to return the global critical minerals market to a healthier, more competitive state: a preferential trade zone for critical minerals protected from external disruptions through enforceable price floors,” Vance explained. Meanwhile, the US—and other countries around the world—are deploying oil reserves to buffer price shocks caused by the Israel-US attacks on Iran. Price floors and supply management programs seem common sense to these policymakers when it comes to oil and minerals, but what about US farmers and our overall food system?
Like oil and critical minerals, food and agriculture supply chains, such as corn, soy, and dairy, are vulnerable to global shocks, including extreme weather events, wars, and other supply disruptions. The public also needs to understand that without inflation-adjusted price floors, agricultural commodity prices may sink to disastrously low levels, leaving farmers no choice but to increase production with more chemicals and GMO seeds at the expense of our land and water. Congress and the US Department of Agriculture can avoid low prices by creating reserves accumulated during large harvests and, just like the federal petroleum reserve, bringing them back on the market to stabilize prices in times of shortage. We can all agree that food shortages would be disastrous, so guaranteeing its citizens food security should be imperative for any democratic government.
So while Republicans can recognize the importance of price floors and supply management during this administration, Democrats should look at history to understand how the same instruments were developed for agriculture during the Great Depression under the Democratic Party’s New Deal. The twin crises of farm bankruptcies and the Dust Bowl spurred militant farm organizations to demand a response from the federal government. The response was parity farm bills that stopped farm bankruptcies and stabilized the farm economy so that conservation measures and preservation of diversified farming could lead to food security and a balanced economy. Federal leadership in the White House and Congress recognized that price and supply management benefited both farmers and society as a whole. The policy was simple and transparent: The farm bill would ensure that during years of good harvests, public grain reserves would purchase the surplus at the parity rate (price floor adjusted for inflation) and store it to protect consumers in future times of shortage.
A productive agricultural economy that conserves our resources, challenges agricultural consolidation, and offers economic opportunity in rural communities should be a top priority for all our citizens.
However, both parties abandoned this common-sense approach to farm policy in the early 1950s, so that costs of farming have totally outpaced commodity prices. Subsequently, headlines warning of a farm crisis in 2026, like during the Great Depression and the 1980s, are not uncommon. The prices paid to farmers for commodities such as corn, soybeans, wheat, and dairy have dropped to record lows in real dollars. Over the years, this imbalance has led to the loss of family farms, the consolidation of agribusiness and food processing monopolies, along with their profits benefiting handsomely. Stabilizing the ratio of farm prices to farm costs (the correct goal of any Farm Bill) is the key to a sustainable agriculture that avoids soil loss, water pollution, and the decline of rural communities.
A supply management program would not only help revive family operations and rural economies but would also be essential to combat the expansion of confined animal feeding operations (CAFOs) and lower costs for taxpayers. As reported by Food & Water Watch, CAFOs are a disaster for our climate, air, and water, especially for nearby communities. CAFOs are among the most egregious features of today’s low-price, commodity-based industrial agriculture. Thousands of livestock (owned or vertically integrated with large food processors) are confined in small facilities without fresh air or sunlight and fed cheap corn and soy.
CAFOs have been replacing conscientious family farmers who are stewards of the soil and their animals. When family farmers are forced out of livestock production, they face the dilemma of “get big or get out” and often have no farming alternatives other than to tear up their pastures to grow corn and soybeans that will end up feeding animals in CAFOs.
The Trump administration is applying often-forgotten policy instruments to sustain our fossil fuel dependence and our high-tech future, rather than prioritizing a resilient, sustainable economy. Managing a price floor and creating federal food reserves in the agriculture sector are necessary to combat the adverse effects of food processor monopolization, farm consolidation, soil and water degradation, and external shocks, such as wars.
A productive agricultural economy that conserves our resources, challenges agricultural consolidation, and offers economic opportunity in rural communities should be a top priority for all our citizens. “We love farmers” and “We put America’s farmers first” are just political slogans to get votes with no substance behind them. These slogans lead to the usual sleight of hand to send taxpayer dollars to get some farmers through the next planting season. This policy leaves the disastrous cheap commodity regime in place—encouraging CAFO production and exporting commodities at a loss.
The administration’s discovery of the logical policy of price floors and reserves for oil and minerals must open new doors to applying these logical and transparent mechanisms to agriculture to restore the security of family farmers and conservation of our precious resources—after all, we can’t eat petroleum or precious minerals.
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Tariffs Won't Save America’s Farms; Community-Rooted Solar Power Might
Rethinking how we use the land means American farms can stay in business, producing food and energy that remains local while we invest back into our communities.
Jun 01, 2026
America’s farmers are in big trouble. Despite the recent politically timed purchase of 12 million metric tons of US soybeans by China, after months of cancelled or stalled sales, the market remains volatile and uncertain. China now publicly favors cheaper Brazilian soybeans, and US soy exports to China have fallen to their lowest level in more than two decades.
The decline of this important market compounds other struggles farmers like me are facing, including falling commodity prices and rising costs. The number of farm bankruptcies remains troublingly high.
But there’s a solution that can help farmers lower their costs and reduce dependence on volatile foreign markets, while producing cheaper, cleaner energy for all Americans. It’s called agri-energy, and it offers a viable pathway to both food and energy independence.
American farmers were hurting long before the tariffs were put in place. Despite record yields, farming accounts for less than 1% of the American GDP and we have now entered an agricultural trade deficit.
When small farmers are forced to “get out,” our land is typically sold to large farm corporations, to real estate developers, or, God forbid, to the Dollar General corporation.
Any healthy economy relies on diversity, but we put all of our eggs into the corn and soy baskets long ago. Corn and soy are the top two agricultural commodities produced in the United States. This means that any shift in global markets—like the current trade war—can leave farmers with full silos and empty bank accounts.
Now, we’re scrambling to figure out how to recover our investments when we’ve already put so much money, time, and generational resources into these monocultures. Our yields might be excellent, but with corn and soy prices declining sharply relative to production costs, that may not matter much.
The Trump administration’s “solution” is to provide assistance to farmers in the form of relief checks and subsidies, which is akin to putting a Band-Aid on a bleeding femoral artery. Might look okay for a minute, but it’s not going to stop the flow (in this case, the flow of bankruptcies and foreclosures).
What we need to do is start focusing on whole-systems approaches. That’s where agri-energy comes into play.
Agri-energy, also known as agrivoltaics or dual-use solar, involves growing crops or grazing livestock under solar panels, allowing farmers to double dip on their land. By leasing their land for solar energy production, farmers get a nice bumper crop each year—with lease payments averaging $1,000 or more per acre. It’s consistent, reliable income that’s not dependent on the global commodity market.
Because solar leases are long—20 to 30 years or more—there’s more predictability and stability in this kind of setup than perhaps any other agricultural model. If a farmer is ready to lease his land and get out of farming entirely, agri-energy allows for another farmer to manage that land in his place. That’s the case for our family farm—we receive payment from the solar company for vegetation management services on other sites.
On a broader scale, practices like rotational grazing (typically the go-to on solar farms) improve soil quality and leave the land healthier than it was prior to the solar farm’s installation. The animals benefit, too, from improved forage and shade, reaching heavier finishing and weaning weights at a lower cost to the farmer. This, too, we’ve seen firsthand on the solar farms we graze.
Rethinking how we use the land means American farms can stay in business, producing food and energy that remains local while we invest back into our communities.
Some worry that agri-energy will take good land out of agriculture. But the reliable income from solar leases can actually keep farmers on the land. This is especially important for small farmers like me who were once told to “get big or get out.”
When small farmers are forced to “get out,” our land is typically sold to large farm corporations, to real estate developers, or, God forbid, to the Dollar General corporation. Remember: Prime farmland doesn’t remain farmland if it’s not farmed.
If we really want to reduce our reliance on global trade, agri-energy—not tariffs—may be the silver bullet we’re looking for.
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