TOP HEADLINES
Trade concerns surrounding Trump’s wall hit agriculture prices:
If Presidents Trump and Nieto escalate their dispute and trade slows down between the two nations, U.S. farmers could suffer. Partially due to these concerns, grains and livestock all fell near two-week lows on Friday [The Oklahoman].
Washington Week Ahead: Court pick coming, war on regs continues:
President Donald Trump has promised to announce a Supreme Court nominee this week, while Congress begins to move measures to kill new regulations on the energy industry [Agri-Pulse].
CONGRESS
Lankford critical of Democrats in Pruitt EPA nomination:
Oklahoma U.S. Sen. James Lankford says it could be nearly two more weeks before Attorney General Scott Pruitt is confirmed to be the new Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency [OK Energy Today].
Senate panel to vote on confirming Trump EPA pick:
Senate Environment and Public Works Committee Chairman John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) announced Friday that the panel will vote Feb. 1 on sending current Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt’s (R) nomination to the full Senate [The Hill].
STATE
Bill filing deadline cues budget discussions before session:
With an estimated budget shortfall of $868 million for this legislative session, Rep. John Pfeiffer, R-Orlando, said many legislators were elected this year knowing the budget is the main issue [Enid News & Eagle].
Oklahoma’s energy sector continues to recover:
Eleven months after the oil and natural gas industry bottomed out in the deepest downturn in a generation, prices are climbing and oil field activity is recovering [The Oklahoman].
MISCELLANEOUS
In America’s heartland, discussing climate change without saying ‘climate change’:
Here in north-central Kansas, America’s breadbasket and conservative heartland, the economic realities of agriculture make climate change a critical business issue. This is wheat country, and Donald J. Trump country, and though the weather is acting up, the conservative orthodoxy maintains that the science isn’t settled [New York Times].
U.S. needs American ag company to counter foreign competition:
Given the current landscape, now more than ever America’s farmers need what Dow and DuPont are proposing – a strong, focused American agriculture company that is American-owned, championing the interests of the American farmer in a marketplace that may soon be dominated by foreign-owned behemoths [Morning Consult].
These California and Oregon farmers lost water in 2001. Now they want to be paid:
Years in the making, the trial set to start Monday in the U.S. Court of Federal Claims near the White House involves a lot of money, but that’s not all. For other Westerners, too, it can have broader implications, clarifying what the government may owe for water steered away from crops toward environmental protection [Merced Sun-Star].
