Minority groups demand Harris commit to redress to black farmers


The following letter to Vice President Kamala Harris is from a coalition of minority advocates regarding the plight of black farmers in the US.

October 24, 2024
Vice President Kamala Harris
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue
Washington, DC 20050

We represent the USDA Coalition of Minority Employees and the Justice for Black Farmers Group, and we have done so since our beginning with the United States Agriculture (USDA) in 1994 as we have advocated for Black farmers as well as for women within the institution who are being mistreated.

Our motivations for contacting you are simple. Vice President Harris, you have the President’s ear in these final days, and you have much influence with the American people and various subgroups want your support and for that, you get their votes.

We have had two in-depth conversations/interviews with Drs. Cornel West and Jill Stein. As you know, they are candidates for the presidency in 2024. We just talked a few weeks ago to Dr. Stein in Philadelphia regarding widespread abuses at the USDA. Both of them expressed a deep concern about the lack of leadership, accountability, transparency, oversight, and justice which are lacking at the USDA. We wish to hear the same from the two of you.

We recognize within a few short weeks that the people will have spoken and you, VP Harris, stand an excellent chance at being our next president. In these unprecedented times, much is demanded of our public servants, perhaps more than at most any time in the history of our country. This letter, then, will provide the justification for our list of asks.

Black farmers’ skepticism of President Biden remains entrenched and as his VP, some of that follows you. And, our opposition to the President appointing Vilsack goes back to the very beginning.

As we wrote in our most recent letter to you and President Biden on August 16, 2024, our message has been consistent since our inception in 1994 as the USDA Coalition of Minority Employees. From the earlies stages of our communications with Vilsack in 2011, the White House, staffers, and others, our message has been clear and our list of concerns lengthy and legitimate. In fact, a lengthier list is found in correspondence with President Biden in 2022 in which we advocated for systemic change.

We have previously chronicled some crucial historical points, beginning with Senator Elizabeth Warren during her campaign for the presidency, and the development of her policy to address Black land loss, racism, USDA’s failures, and a myriad of other matters in a document that became the standard bearer for the promotion of justice for Black farmers.

Several senators including Elizabeth Warren, Cory Booker, and Raphael Warnock succeeded in writing and submitting to the Senate an important piece of legislation, The Justice for Black Farmers Act.  It marked the significance of historical issues and mistreatment of Black farmers.

We have found the White House and the USDA to be closed systems, closed to us in particular in our efforts to address the concerns noted above to the officials who have the influence to take corrective measures. Secretary Vilsack ignored us except for one unsatisfactory meeting via technology as has President Biden. Only Cedric Richmond and William T. McIntee, in the Office of Public Engagement gave us a fair hearing.

We participated with the agriculture transition team, learned that it was steered by Tom Vilsack, and were informed eventually that what we were seeking was unconstitutional. Next came the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (ARPA) that brought about the banking industry’s complaints and a slow walking process by Secretary Vilsack that allowed twelve frivolous and racist lawsuits to be filed by white farmers alleging reverse discrimination. See those details here.

With the passage of the ARPA, we celebrated with Senators Warnock, Warren, and Booker and numerous Black farmers and members of the USDA Coalition of Minority Employees and the Justice for Black Farmers group, but our celebration was short lived and the courts and the white farmer cases stymied our progress.

Senators Raphael Warnock and Cory Booker have in the past shown their interest and concerns regarding the continued abuse at USDA; however, in the past few years because of their busy schedules and political obligations, they have been prevented from doing what is really needed at USDA…..to put the Department into “receivership.” The reason is that USDA is not properly carrying out or implementing its own rules and regulations. The decades of failures regarding Black farmers and abuse of women employees at the US Forest Service, has been long documented at USDA, in the Congress, and nationwide.

Next, Congress passed the race neutral Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 which allocated $3.1B for “distressed borrowers” who could be of any race or gender and their debts would be brought to zero. Additionally, a sum of $2.2B was allocated for farmers who could prove that they had experienced discrimination, regardless of race, color, creed, national origin, and gender. We critiqued this bill and its outcomes quite intensely in a letter to the President. The process proved to be laborious but ultimately approximately $1.76B was allocated to Black farmers and the remainder to others.

The process was laborious and complicated, some farmers died before they could see any benefits from the lengthy chain of events and entities. Relatively few of our friends received any benefits as it appears that the few who did were hand-picked by the USDA.

So, that is where we are with regard to finances. However, the saga continues with other matters, and we would like to outline them for you.

We know of zero Black farmers meeting with the President though we do know of a few who have met with FSA Director, Zach Ducheneaux. Their voices are important and unheard.

A significant piece of research found that between 1910 and 1997, Black farmers losses amounted to approximately $326B. Those losses will never be made up. In terms of the pandemic relief funding of billions of dollars, only 0.1% went to Black farmers. This is one example of the many burdens placed upon our Black farmers in rural America.

Various studies from within the federal government have validated what we believe, that inadequacies impact all of us. In November, 2023, the General Accounting Office (GAO) provided a scathing rebuke of the internal tracking system for complaints. The Office of the Inspector General (OIG) reported in September, 2021 that the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights was failing to process complaints in a timely manner and potential circumvention of the law. A recent doctoral dissertation provided a negative evaluation of the county committee system, one which continues to be protected by Secretary Vilsack.

Secretary Vilsack refuses to provide information about loans and services by race, asserting that to do so would be illegal, despite two Farm Bills that demand the collection and dispersal of this information. We know globally but not specifically these numbers.

Various investigative reports “The Machine that Eats up Black Farmland,” by Joyce, Rosenberg, and Stucki; ”Forced Off Their Land,” by Holloway; and “How USDA Distorted Data to Conceal Decades of Discrimination Against Black Farmers,” by Rosenberg and Stucki; and numerous internal and external reports, accumulated by the Environmental Working Group, all tell the tragedies of white farmers being advantaged in all areas by comparison to Black farmers. These matters of racism and injustice have been occurring under the current administration as well as that of Obama, Bush, Clinton, and previous administrations for decades. The USDA acts as if it is a law to themselves and fails at too many levels to display transparency, accountability, and a commitment to removing racism from its halls and offices. The Equity Commission of Vilsack and the failures of the County Committee system are two that are most obvious to us.

While this is merely the tip of the iceberg for us as advocates, we have not been silent nor invisible. We have written numerous letters to the White House, the USDA, and to others. We have published many letters in various open forums. Perhaps you know that on March 1, 2023, a large number of us demonstrated in front of the White House with placards, signs, and megaphones.  

We, therefore, have several asks of you, Vice President Harris. We hear you say that you are not afraid of good ideas and that you will not shy away from them. Here, therefore, are our issues to discuss with you and/or your top advisors.

  • Work together with us and meet with us as have Drs. West and Stein.
  • Place USDA at the top of your list of priorities and create practical options for rural America and Black farmers.
  • Hear and validate the pain and suffering of Black farmers and families.
  • Address the problems within the Office of Civil Rights and compel the office to settle complaints of Black farmers that are languishing there.
  • Appoint a new Secretary within your administration, one with the trust of Black farmers and other advocates.
  • Compel USDA to develop a course of action that eliminates sexism and sexual assaults and other abuses experienced by women in the forestry division, Western Region.
  • Compel USDA to develop a course of action that eliminates racism and unfair practices that disadvantage Black farmers and favor white farmers.
  • Compel USDA to develop processes that create justice, accountability, and transparency throughout the department.
  • Require that leadership within USDA address the area in which most discrimination occurs, the Farm Service Administration at the county committee level.

Many African Americans in urban America are only one or two generations away from the farm in rural America and it is important to know the deep connections between the two. Some of us feel forgotten because of the extensive focus on urban America. To begin to address these matters even prior to the election would make a dramatic statement to our people. Black farmers and families are rural America.

We follow you and your campaign closely and appreciate the town halls that you have been in including the one on CNN last night. We understand your time constraints as you travel and speak over the next two weeks. Therefore, we request an immediate conversation with one of your closest advisors, Cedric Richmond, to discuss our issues and concerns relative to Black and minority farmers and abused women within USDA and larger systemic issues.  

We stand available to answer any and all of your questions and assist you in this regard. Many Black farmers and their advocates feel abandoned by our Black leadership in Washington and in rural America. We are “the voice of the voiceless.”

Respectfully,

Lawrence Lucas
President Emeritus, USDA Coalition for Minority Employees
Representative, Justice for Black Farmers Group
www.blackmeninAmerica.com

Waymon R. Hinson, Ph.D.
Representative, USDA Coalition of Minority Employees
Representative, Justice for Black Farmers Group
www.letjusticering.blogspot.com
Psychologist


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