OKAgPolicy Today is a morning email containing the day’s top agriculture and policy headlines. The inclusion of a particular story does not equal an endorsement. Subscribe to the email here.
TOP HEADLINES
Could AG Pruitt be Trump’s EPA pick?:
Pruitt was one of the first state attorneys general to file suit against EPA over WOTUS, and he has also challenged clean air and other agency regulations that he says amount to regulatory overreach [Politico].
Inhofe welcomes regulation rollbacks under Trump:
A fierce critic of federal environmental regulations and a consistent climate change skeptic, Sen. Jim Inhofe is welcoming a Donald Trump presidency with elation. “I’m still celebrating,” said Inhofe, R-Tulsa, who spoke briefly with The Oklahoman on Monday during a trip to Oklahoma City [The Oklahoman].
FEDERAL
A potential pothole in Trump’s infrastructure plan:
Investors have cheered President-elect Donald Trump’s proposal to spend $1 trillion on infrastructure over the next 10 years. But economists are questioning the plan’s upside for the economy given its unusual and convoluted structure, which they say portends less actual infrastructure improvement and more private-sector profits [CBS News].
Trump rollback of Obama climate agenda may prove challenging:
Once sworn into office, Donald Trump will be in a strong position to dismantle some of President Barack Obama’s efforts to reduce planet-warming carbon emissions. But experts say delivering on campaign pledges to abolish the Environmental Protection Agency and bring back tens of thousands of long-gone coal mining jobs will likely prove far more difficult for the new president [AP].
U.S. companies hope Trump will stick to business roots, back Cuba ties:
Trump won the White House on promises to create jobs. Advocates for increased engagement argue that promoting U.S. trade with Cuba would create opportunities, and jobs, in industries from telecommunications to agriculture, and particularly in tourism [Reuters].
Anxiety among farm groups as battle lines harden on immigration reform:
But farm groups are still anxious and hope to convince the next administration that developing a better guest-worker program — and not just tightening the border — needs to be a priority of any immigration reform [Successful Farming].
More seasonal workers from overseas head to Mid-South farms:
Farmers have to get the crop out and must make a living. They look to hire locally but have to go where the labor is. Most of them would probably tell you it’d be cheaper if they could hire locally [Delta Farm Press].
MISCELLANEOUS
Vilsack’s tough message for fellow Democrats: Stop writing off rural America:
Even before Trump’s surprising victory this month, Vilsack was complaining, sometimes loudly and often with little effect, that his party had essentially given up competing in large swaths of the country that it needed to win Senate seats, governor’s races and state legislatures. “Democrats need to talk to rural voters,” Vilsack warned this summer [Washington Post].
The benefits of mandatory GMO labeling:
The issue in ascertaining the value of a label isn’t whether consumers are willing a premium for non-GM over GM food. Rather…what is key is whether the added information would have changed what people bought [Jayson Lusk Blog].
