Democrats are finally taking rural voters seriously

All too often, rural America is neglected by candidates at the top of the ticket. And when those candidates do the token farm stop, they often hit on a handful of tired messages about feeding the world, creating new markets for a few commodity crops and preventing taxes on farm wealth while standing in front of a million dollar combine.

If you listen to the pundits and highly paid talking heads, former President Trump has farm support all locked up. In reality this support represents endorsements from a very narrow group of the largest farmers, agribusinesses and their front groups who care more about tax cuts and protecting subsidies for a handful of crops and massive livestock feeding operations than they do about the millions of rural people who don’t own thousands of acres and millions of dollars of farming equipment.

But this year is shaping up a little differently. Mr. Trump’s coziness with Robert F. Kennedy Jr. — including rhetoric about making America healthier, banning pesticides, reining in ultra-processed foods, and calling for wholesale change in the Department of Agriculture and Food and Drug Administration — has shaken his support among agribusinesses and the biggest commodity farmers.

On the other hand, Vice President Kamala Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz recently unveiled a plan for rural communities that provides a stark contrast. It features a lot of health care priorities, along with an assortment of rural economic development and farm initiatives.

Walz announced the campaign’s plan during a campaign event on October 15 at the third-generation Telesz farm in Lawrence County, Pennsylvania. “The idea that you have to get bigger or get out is nonsense,” Walz said. “We will invest in rural communities and family farms.”

Some of the specifics in the Harris-Walz rural plan include:

Recruiting 10,000 health care professionals to rural America through a variety of grants, loan forgiveness programs, scholarships and workforce training stipends.
Expanding telemedicine programs, which rural people are 17 times more likely to use than urban people, and permanently extend telemedicine coverage under Medicare.
Providing more funding and support for both professional and volunteer rural ambulances, with the goal of cutting in half the number of Americans living more than 25 minutes away from an ambulance.
Supporting existing independent pharmacies, and also increasing the number of pharmacies that can serve rural communities without access to local prescription drugs.
Increasing funding and availability of tax credits for rural small business development.
Building 3 million new homes nationally, both owner-occupied and rental, including in rural and tribal areas, and providing up to $25,000 in down payment assistance for first-time homebuyers. The plan also calls for cracking down on predatory investors.
Re-enacting the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP), a pandemic program that provided up to $30 off monthly internet bills. In rural and tribal communities, 3 million people benefited from ACP.
Passing the Rural Partnership and Prosperity Act, a bill that provides funding for local collaborative efforts to comprehensively address community needs for child care, housing, job training and economic development.
Expanding the Rural Partners Network, a program that provides paid professionals to help rural communities apply for federal grants.
Increasing support for beginning farmers through loans and land access programs.
Supporting farmland protection through easements.
Passing the Agricultural Right to Repair Act, a bill that requires farm equipment manufacturers to provide information about parts, tools, software and manuals to farmers and independent repair shops so that equipment breakdowns can be fixed without being prey to the manufacturers’ mechanics.
Continuing to fight against consolidation by passing bills such as the Meat Packing Special Investigator Act.

Like most campaign plans, the list is long on goals and short on specifics as to how a Harris-Walz Administration would accomplish these wins for rural communities. It can’t be overstated that the political future of these objectives will be decided by which party controls the House of Representatives and the Senate.

While we commend the effort and work put into this document during a compressed campaign, the Harris-Walz rural plan seems to be missing a huge opportunity: it fails to address the reality of corporate control over nearly every aspect of rural life, from hospitals to agriculture markets. This leaves a significant hole in the Democrats’ arguments about how they might handle their weakest issues, the economy and inflation.

Let us explain.

Vice President Harris has rightfully condemned price gouging as a key contributor to inflation. While this rhetoric is good, it is difficult for most people to understand what that phrase means. Further painting the picture of how corporate concentration leads to increased grocery, healthcare and housing prices would be helpful.

For instance, when Republicans attack Democrats about the increased costs of everything from hamburgers to hospital stays, Democrats could name names and explain who exactly benefits and who loses from the corporate-controlled food system or healthcare system.

Harris and Walz could point out that the beef processing giant JBS made record profits while hamburger prices skyrocketed. They could point out that milk processor Dean Foods (brands DairyPure, Land O’Lakes, TruMoo, Friendly’s, Mayfield, Dean’s, Meadow Gold, Tuscan, T.G. Lee and Alta Dena) made record profits while family farm dairies were being driven out of business and consumers were getting ripped off. They could point out that Tyson Foods, again, made record profits while the price of chicken doubled.

Despite their unwillingness to fully name corporations and Wall Street as the problem and explicitly tie those corporate interests to Donald Trump, at least they are beginning to take the rural voter seriously in policy and messaging. The Harris-Walz campaign is investing heavily in a rural radio advertising strategy. They are airing ads on 535 stations, unsurprisingly focused in North Carolina, Georgia, Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania. The campaign says these ads will reach more than 2.15 million rural voters in those states.

“In a small town, you don’t focus on the politics, you focus on taking care of your neighbors and minding your own damn business,” Walz says in the radio ad. “Now Donald Trump and JD Vance, they don’t think like us. They’re in it for themselves.”

While Democrats could still do more to win back rural voters, these efforts might be enough to cut into Mr. Trump’s historically high margins in most rural counties. It’s a hell of a lot more than the token cornfield “feed the world” speech in front of a big John Deere that we have seen from presidential candidates in the past.

--30--