Both Sides Courting Rural Voters

DTN Ag Policy Editor Chris Clayton recently outlined the debate over the rural vote in the upcoming U.S. presidential election.

“Democratic President Barack Obama has supported rural America as farmers achieved record income over the past four years or is “anti-agriculture” and helped induce an unprecedented regulatory burden on rural America,” Clayton wrote in his Ag Police Blog.

“Republican Mitt Romney will either wreck the rural economy and cut meaningful rural programs or unleash greater prosperity by stopping new regulations on farmers and businesses while more aggressively championing free trade deals,” Clayton commented.

Clayton was covering a debate between Sen. Mike Johanns (R-NE), and former Iowa Lt. Gov. Patty Judge, a Democrat who served as Iowa’s agriculture secretary.

Judge said Obama has been fighting to get a five-year farm bill passed while Romney has supported his running mate Paul Ryan’s proposal, which calls for steeper cuts than the Senate or House versions of the farm bill. She blamed Republican leaders in the House, including Ryan, for their efforts to block the farm bill for a floor debate. She added, “Romney would put the rural economy at risk.”

Sen. Johanns set a tone by commenting on Obama, “I don’t use this term lightly but he has been anti-agriculture.” On the farm bill, Johanns said both the House and Senate have made cuts and differences will be worked out once negotiations begin on a conference report. Still, that won’t come quickly, he said. “The key element is to get it right and recognize we are going to have to cut some spending.”

Johanns also noted during the debate that Romney favors eliminating the estate tax, while Obama has supported returning to a $3.5 million exemption with a 45% tax rate. Currently, the exemption is $5 million and the rate is 35%, but those provisions expire at the end of the year.

While rural voters could tip the scales in the presidential battle, it’s also worth noting that about 100 members of the House of Representative will be elected from farming districts. Issues mentioned above are sure to impact those races, and could determine which party controls the U.S. House.