:quality(70)/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/shawmedia/X7LZZGAQYGM4J6QTGCGDBJPVLM.jpg)
WASHINGTON — Following President-elect Joe Biden’s victory over President Donald Trump, Mary Kay Thatcher, Syngenta federal government and industry relations senior manager, looked at the Biden presidency in a Nov. 5 virtual media summit.
From her experience and historical perspective, Thatcher compared Biden to President Gerald Ford.
Thatcher visited Ford’s Presidential Museum in Grand Rapids, Michigan, a few years ago, “and I was stunned by how much it talked about his ability to reach out to the Hill,” she said.
“He knew how to work with them. He had been a House member for 24 years. He’d served as the Minority Leader. So, when he became vice president and then president, it was a normal thing for him to reach out to those folks and to try to get some things done.”
“Biden was in the Senate for 36 years and then eight years as vice president and therefore the president of the Senate. So, he, too, has that same experience, that same knowledge, and people on the Hill are largely friends of his and I think that he will understand that he needs to reach out to them.”
There was concern leading up to the election there could be a Democratic sweep of the White House, Senate and House and that would lead to a mandate for the leading party’s agenda. That did not happen.
“We know from the election nobody is going be able to realistically say they have a mandate and move forward and do whatever. They’re going to have to do some negotiating. But I think Biden knows that,” Thatcher said.
“The flipside of that is I think Biden also will be pushed by the progressive side of the Democrats to rule in their favor on executive orders and new regulations. And certainly with agriculture one of the issues that triggers farmers most in this election is what’s going to happen at EPA, and will a new administrator roll back some of those regulations that Trump put in place that we really like?
“Things like Waters of the U.S., things like approving the registration of dicamba and what will happen there. I think the president will negotiate what he can in legislation and he will pass rules on some other things.
“Unfortunately I think the Waters of the U.S. is one of the regulations that is most likely to maybe not totally be overturned, but changed in a fairly major way at EPA. But that’s no different. The Trump administration rolled back a lot of the Obama administration and the Obama administration rolled back, as well.”
Thatcher covered numerous topics and the potential impact a Biden administration would have on those areas. Here’s what she had to say.
On Taxes
“We look at the idea that presumably President-elect Biden will raise taxes on people who make more than $400,000, change capital gains, change estate taxes, and increase corporate taxes. Those things were in his platform but is that something a Republican Senate is going to be for? No. We have to keep reminding ourselves that just because it’s in a platform that’s not likely the outcome and will require negotiations.”
On Trade
“I would anticipate that there will continue to be tension with China and that Biden will be part of that, but that he will move back to what was more a normal or a usual way of doing business with China or Russia or other countries like that. He will engage our friends, be it the European Union, Australia, Canada, etcetera, to engage China as a group rather than taking the tact that President Trump did, which was, ‘We’re the U.S., we’re the biggest economy, we can use our own weight and not have to do any negotiations with others.’
“I suspect that Mr. Biden is going to be more cautious about ag trade and about doing new trade agreements at least for the first year or two than was President Trump. He’s likely to focus more on enforcement of current trade issues, which we know there’s plenty of issues to look at. I think he’ll continue to be aggressive on China, but he’ll bring in friends to help him accomplish that.
“The U.S.-China trade deal will definitely continue. I don’t see any desire in the Biden administration to pull us out of that. It’s way too important to agriculture.
“Mr. Biden has been pretty open that he would like to get back into the Trans-Pacific Partnership. That’s going to take a while. That’s going to take some negotiations, but agriculture was going to benefit greatly by being part of the TPP. If that’s something he could do, that would be pretty good for agriculture.”
On Climate
“Climate change will be part of any kind of trade discussion. It’s also going to be part of a discussion just on climate change in general. The U.S. has much fewer emissions coming from agriculture compared to other countries around the world. I suspect that becomes a hot topic of conversation.
“Mr. Biden said he would spend up to $2 trillion on climate change initiatives. I think that’s good news from the perspective of farmers in that he’s going to spend that kind of money. There could be new money if you talk about carbon credits. There’s got to be a lot of carrots versus sticks in there. I don’t think the Senate Republicans are going to let climate change be debated in that kind of a manner, but very it’s likely to be discussed.”
On Immigration Reform
“I would say that maybe we have a better chance on immigration reform than we had under Trump. I in no way think it will be an easy lift. I’ve been in Washington 40 years and every year I hear the immigration experts say they’re going to pass a immigration reform bill this year and of course it never happens. There’s a possibility. I do believe the good news is I don’t think an immigration bill will pass that doesn’t include some positive changes for agriculture.”
On Infrastructure
“Congress is getting more urban and less rural. Sixteen percent (70 seats) of the 435 members are ranked as serving in pure rural districts. What is concerning is that 61 of those 70 seats are Republicans and only nine are Democrats and after the election on Tuesday one of them was Collin Peterson. Now we’re down to presumably eight Democrats. What is the issue?
“Let’s think about an infrastructure bill. Those eight Democrats are the ones that you’re going to rely on to go to Nancy Pelosi to say they want infrastructure money to fix the Mississippi River where ‘X percent’ of our exports go down the river to go elsewhere in the world. You’re going to have the rest of the Democrats wanting to improve the subways in their city, or put money into Amtrak or more road improvements in their city. That fact is in agriculture we desperately need people both on the Republican side and the Democratic side to go to leadership to argue what’s important to ag.
“If we don’t continue to have a bipartisan force doing that in the House we’re going to be up a creek without a paddle.”
On Support Payments
“The appetite for payments to farmers whether President Trump was reelected or Joe Biden comes in is lessening. I think many believe President Trump tried to buy farmers with those payments. He wouldn’t have to if he was reelected for the next four years because he can’t run again. I think both Mr. Biden and Mr. Trump have both heard from lots of people who are concerned, jealous, ‘Why do farmers get all this money, maybe I got a paycheck program payment, but it didn’t work very well or wasn’t very much, but why are farmers getting something that many small businesses in the country are not getting?’
“While I do think there will be another COVID package and agriculture will be part of that, I don’t know if it will be at the $16 billion or $20 billion level. Certainly we seem to be a very long ways away in the negotiations between Nancy Pelosi and President Trump, so I can’t speculate on what the amount will be but I think agriculture will be part of the next package. But at some point people have to wake up from a $4 trillion deficit and say how much more can we spend without have an offset, so I think the appetite for a lot of spending is going to diminish.”