Two weeks after the U.S. House passed its “skinny” Farm Bill — the law’s usual lard had been cut into last July’s reconciliation bill — applause is still yet to be heard in either Washington, D.C. or rural America.
One big reason might be exhaustion. After three years of pushing, fingerpointing and arguing, Republican members of the House Ag Committee found a path to passage: Cut food assistance programs by $186 billion (“waste, fraud and abuse”), use $60 billion of it to fatten federal farm subsidies, and add 30 million more “base” acres to those programs to ensure every cent will be spent.
I know what you’re thinking: Isn’t there any “waste, fraud, or abuse” in those millions of acres and billions in benefits? Certainly — at least when anyone looks for it.
After the bill passed the House, members of the Senate Ag Committee, the bill’s next stop, received it with the mild reception it deserves. It is, after all, a fatter, warmed-over version of the 2018 Farm Bill, itself a fatter, warmed-over version of the 2014 Farm Bill.
That’s troublesome because little in the bill addresses the challenges American farmers and ranchers face today. Global export competition? Meh. Changing climate? Fake news. Increasing groundwater shortages? Crickets. Fast-rising input costs? We’ll look into it.
That last one is particularly revealing given that the Department of Justice recently announced it will investigate the Big Four beef packers over “whether market concentration has driven higher beef prices.”
In announcing the investigation, Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche emphasized that “there’s a lot of work to do and we are moving as quickly as we can.”
The speed at which the DOJ acts against the Big Four — JBS USA, Cargill, Tyson Foods and National Beef Packing — is immaterial for two reasons.
First, given today’s 71-year low in cattle numbers, every packer is losing their hide killing cattle today. Tyson Foods, Reuters reported recently, said “it expects an adjusted operating loss of $350 million to $500 million in its beef business in fiscal 2026.”
In short, the most obvious connection between packers today is red ink, not red blood and not unwarranted, green profits.
Second, there is a mini-meatpacking boom underway in the U.S. Since 2023, plants with a combined daily kill capacity of nearly 9,000 head have been built in cattle country. Also, the number of small, local federally-inspected plants nationwide has increased from 726 in 2021 to 937 in 2025.
So, sure, investigate the beef packers if you think there are crimes — or, more to the point, voters — to be found. No one, however, should be surprised when the decades-too-late investigation turns into a big nothing burger that no one will claim they cooked up.
The DOJ examination of JBS USA, the massive global meatpacker, is especially juicy given the dual role it plays both in the U.S. and its native Brazil. U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins noted one of those roles — but not the other — during the DOJ announcement of its packer investigation.
JBS, Rollins said according to Progressive Farmer, is “‘affiliated with corruption… cartels and as recently as last week, slave labor.’” And, she added, “all of that was bad enough on its own, but it’s also to the detriment of America’s great independent ranchers and consumers…”
I can’t tell you what an “independent consumer” is but I can tell you that despite corruption, cartels, and slave labor, Brazilian beef is pouring into the U.S. In the first quarter 2026, Brazil exported $795 million of beef to the U.S., up 21% from 2025.
And every pound of it was to the detriment of America’s great independent ranchers.
(The Farm and Food File is published weekly throughout the U.S. Contact information is posted at farmandfoodfile.com. ©2026 ag comm)
