Todd Gleason: From the land to Grant University in Urbana Champaign, Illinois. This is a special edition of the closing market report presentations from the twenty twenty five Farm Assets Conference, Ag Policy Objectives and Prospects. I'm University of Illinois Extension's Todd Gleeson. Up next, a critical discussion on the evolving landscape of agricultural policy and markets. This panel features KJ Johnson of the Illinois Fertilizer and Chemical Association, Brad Stottler from the Illinois Corn Growers Association, and Jonathan Kopas of the University of Illinois.

Together we'll dive into the pressing issues facing farmers today including market shifts, political climate, trade and tariffs, and the farm bell.

Brad Stotler: Well, thanks a lot, Todd. Brad Stotler with the Illinois Corn Growers Association. A little bit about my background. I've been with corn growers for three years. Before that, I worked for congressman LaHood.

I've been in and out of trade associations and things of that nature working in government affairs. Actually, way back in the day, I worked for congressman Tim Johnson, and that's when I first met KJ here. He just graduated from ISU. I was at U of I. I started to work for him, and so we've known each other for quite a while.

Obviously, the the man, the myth, the legend here, Jonathan Kopas. So it's been it's been an an interesting ride within public policy. I think, when I was kinda coming here today, I was thinking about, you know, what are some words that you think about when you think about this congressional landscape right now? When you think about ag policy right now, it's you know, is predictability, certainty, bipartisanship? I mean, obviously not.

Right? That's a big no. It's partisanship. People are getting less interested in working with each other right now. And so, you know, how does this all go?

I mean, from what I talk when I talk to people on the hill, others, there's a lot of, members who are getting worn out. We're seeing that now with retirements. There's, like, 30 or 40 members who have already announced retirements. Illinois delegation wise, we're gonna see a big shift as well. We have, our senator our senior senator has announced his retirement, and that's caused a after a long and distinguished career, by the way, in many policy areas, agriculture included.

Wanted to get that in there. But it's caused a cascade of of retirements around the Illinois delegation for people to not only run for that seat, but then we're seeing it in other places. So Raja Krishnamurthy and Robin Kelly are retiring to run for that seat. Our lieutenant governor is also running for that senate seat. On the democratic side, there's, Don Tracy from the republican side is running.

On the, for other Illinois delegation members, you have Chewy Garcia, Danny Davis, Jan Schakowski also retiring from the Chicago area. So you're gonna see a massive shift right now. If you all wanna get involved in politics and start to work on a campaign, this is the year. You can you you you can find some places to help a a campaign on both the Republican and Democratic side because we have a governor's race as well. And so, yeah, I think that, you know, my words were pretty tame.

I've been watching Jonathan speak a little bit lately, and so he's got a much wider vocabulary than I do when it comes to farm policy and kind of the descriptions around that. But, so I'll let him go for the colorful language on on some of, those policies. But I think, generally from Illinois corn standpoint, I mean, we've seen uncertainty grow within our membership. We take an annual survey at our farm progress show, and this is before we've seen the payment announcements this earlier week. I mean, this morning, we saw some more talk about that, and I don't know if we're gonna kinda discuss and get into that, Todd.

But we have seen people think about payments and the need for them. We've seen profitability and certainty over the last several years. We've heard a lot of people talk about that today. In our surveys, saw, you know, Illinois corn growers have always been about markets, not payments, but the uncertainty has caused people, you know, kind of need for those to to rise. We've seen those indexes and those kind of numbers that rise within our policy surveys.

And so, when we think about public policy, we're looking at, you know, we're thinking about expanding markets. How do we push more grain abroad in those kind of trade agreements? We're thinking about how do we improve corn grind in our renewable fuel space in ethanol. How do we raise blends? How do we talk about octane legislation to help that corn grind, grow?

And then finally, this is going to be an issue into the future, but when we think about risk management tools, how, are they gonna work for Midwest farmers into the future? And so, the one big beautiful bill has been, I mean, you you say that because you have to talk about it in that way, but that did a lot for farm policy. That's called the reconciliation farm bill now. Right? Because it took care of title one.

There were things about insurance in that bill as well, and so that is now in law until 2031. And so how will the farm bill look into the future is a big question mark.

Todd Gleason: Thank you very much, Brad. Let's move KJ to you. KJ Johnson is with the Illinois Fertilizer and Chemical Association. He's the president. Yep.

Believe that's correct title there.

KJ Johnson: That's correct.

Todd Gleason: And the incoming Illinois Saving Association legislative liaison starting in January. Thank you for all your work. Do a lot of work both in Springfield currently and look towards Washington DC. When you were thinking about what the discussion should focus on from your point of view today, what did you land on?

KJ Johnson: So most of our stuff with IFCA that we've been working on nationally is all about tariffs. I mean, tariffs, and then more tariffs. This started in April with some of the tariffs that was posed out there by the administration. It directly affects us. And most of you guys have heard it on fertilizer.

Wanna talk on the chemical side too. We had the first thing came out was Canadian tariffs, and I don't know if you guys know, but realize that most of the potash that comes into United States is coming out of Canada. I would say about 90% of it is coming out of Canada. So if there's a 25 tariff, that's gonna raise all fertilizer prices on the potash end. I farm in Champaign County with my, Champaign County with my father and two brothers, see direct effect how that is gonna play out.

But that's also played in some of the the phosphate numbers are out there. Now there's some other stuff going on with the phosphate numbers we can get into later. But the biggest thing on nationally, we've been working on farm, but we got but we had smaller issues in the farm. But we don't got the crop insurance, the commodity title, but it's on, the tariff stuff. The president didn't come out here a couple of weeks ago and said we're pulling off those tariffs.

I think that's a good thing. But then he came out when he did the release on you want call it, Trump money, whatever you call it, says, well, we might do something like Canada again. I mean, we are very much pushing back on on that because, I mean, as much as we wanna say we're gonna produce it here, lot a of stuff is not gonna be produced in The States. And I'll tell you on the phosphate, a lot of guys are shutting down mines because the rock isn't profitable. It's and if it's not profitable now, then it ain't gonna be profitable if it goes down 2 or $300 a ton.

Also, so we're we're very much watching that, I'm trying to push administration to not support terrorists, I would tell you, some of our we belong to three national organizations, Fertilizer Institute, CropLife America that works on, pesticide issues in agritair association. They had a call with the administration sometime in October. And I think some of the guys on the talk thought they were gonna get the Rau Rau speech. It's gonna be okay. We're gonna work through the tariff stuff.

That is not what we got. It was tough. We're doing tariffs, and they will come back out with that chart that says our our imports are greater than our exports on this, and that's driving factor on this. How does this play into chemical side stuff? It hasn't been really been talked about, but I would tell you that a lot of the chemical companies, a lot of the generic chemical companies are very much worried about what tariffs come out, especially if it is out of China or, India, very much.

A lot of your active ingredients. That is the building block to build other chemicals long term come out of, China and India. A lot out of India. If they put a tariff on India, that's the biggest worry that we have that you're gonna see those prices go up. A lot the news is talking about fertilizer, but that's what we worry about.

Stateside, I would just tell you guys, there's there's a whole different, anti pesticide bent at the Illinois State Capitol. We always talk about or talk about national stuff, but I would tell you, you need to watch here at home. A lot of, you know, bans on products. There's some different stuff out there, we just saw Brad and I, saw they're talking about it pretty much putting a, a fertilizer applicator license out there, kinda like a pesticide license. So we are watching stuff.

A lot of our time is spent, like, from there. So it's just a lot of different stuff, but mostly tears. We didn't just try to fight back, but I think this is a broader view, where the administration's going at.

Todd Gleason: And Jonathan Kopas, would you like to start with bridge payments? Would you like to start with the One Big Beautiful beautiful bill Bill act? Act? Would Would you you like like to to start start with tariffs? What piece of the pie would you like to eat today?

Jonathan Coppess: Well, the news of the week is the so called bridge payment, which is maybe one of the oddest title. I would say most embarrassing way to frame a payment because we got a bridge from 10,000,000,000 in the spring to 14,000,000,000 in the fall, I guess is the thinking.

Todd Gleason: You might need to explain what those two.

Jonathan Coppess: So in the spring, the economic crop assistance program payments went out. That was $10,000,000,000 that had been appropriated at the 2024. So that should have hit your accounts probably May. Then OB3 reconciliation farm bill ratcheted up reference prices and payment expectations in July. But as you all know, that stuff is a year delayed.

So you won't see an ARC or PLC with the new changes until October '26. Apparently to KJ's point, you know, things are going so swimmingly well with tariffs and trade. We have to bridge with a $12,000,000,000 set of payments now. And then there's already talk about who's gonna I mean, feel like there's a one upmanship kind of game. So 10,000,000,000 by Congress, 12,000,000,000 by the administration, will it be 14 by Congress?

I don't know. But there's already talk about another round. So I think the concern is we're just we're we're not fixing problems. We're not addressing problems. We're throwing an awful lot of money at problems that are gonna be around a lot longer than I think payments will.

So those are some of the challenges, you know. I I I love being the happy, bright, sunshiny, optimistic person in these pre holiday meetings. I appreciate that, Kyle.

Todd Gleason: I I wanna bring you to a different part of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act because I personally have been involved in the Eastern Illinois Food Bank. That's one of the things that I'm have liked to do in the past. And this disconnect between the farm bill and the food and feeding programs concerned me personally because of my background and how that might turn on producers in the future if there is not this collegial across the board feeling as it's related to a farm bill which has generally been what 80% food and feeding programs and 20% farm programs and without without the ability and the one big beautiful act bill act I think took most of it away to have to work with the other with with those representatives both from rural and urban districts that are food and feeding folks as opposed to farm bill folks, feels like a really big issue to me.

Jonathan Coppess: Yeah. Mean, you're talking about the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. It used to be called food stamps. Since 1973, they've been in the same farm bill together largely for a variety of reasons, but beginning political vote counting in the House in particular. But also the sense of farmers are in the business of producing foods and helping people buy food.

There is a logic to that. The Rexelation Farm Bill, this is one of the reasons why I think what we have long thought to be a farm bill is no longer the case. I think we have to sort of accept that that farm bill is dead, that it's gone, that it's done, and we've moved into something else. What that looks like, I don't know. But they cut $200,000,000,000 out of snap.

About 70,000,000,000 of that cut from snap was used to offset the cost of increasing reference prices and plc, our payment calculations, and crop insurance calculations. That is what we have long called the cardinal rule of farm bills. What you do not ever do in a farm bill, and I got lectured about this when I started on the hill, is you don't take from one pot and put it in the other, and you certainly don't take from food assistance and pour it into farm assistance. So what they did in the reconciliation farm bill is break what is considered the most fundamental political rule for the farm bill. And that's why I'm not trying to be negative, but that's why my conclusions are all less than optimistic about what this looks like in the future.

And I don't to your question, I don't know. Like, as Brad said, we got till 2031 before a lot of reauthorization discussion happens with the exception of CRP, Conservation Reserve Program. What happens from now and then obviously is a vast, vast unknown. But did you have yeah.

Brad Stotler: I've over the years, KJ KJ can come on comment on this too, but I remember on the hill, were movements to kind of separate the farm bill away from food assistance. And bipartisanly, used to talk about how if anyone was serious about ever passing a farm bill, you know, I've never seen a proposal that was serious to pass a farm bill by splitting the two apart. And then here we are in this in this world. And so, you know, we have this we have several of the titles now, through 2031, and then we'll have kind of, you know, obviously all the others on this September extension time frame into next year. And then, you know, so that so then you hear on the hill, well, let's start up negotiations on these other titles.

But with kind of the discussion around all of the different payments, it just hard and then other things that are going on in congress, it's it's gonna be a challenge and and for us as an ag community for us to come together and and try to repair that traditional farm bill approach is gonna be something that we all need to think about and work together on.

KJ Johnson: 100% agree. I think it's I'll just be honest. Completely assimilate we separate them. Because I will go back and say, when I was working for Tim in o two and o eight when we passed farm bills, you guys remember Jesse Jackson Junior was a congressman from Chicago. And I remember our boss talking to him like, hey, we need we want votes to get be show bipartisan.

He's like as long as the nutritional stuff's in there I'm a yes vote. If we take that away we're not gonna get it. Now Jonathan's a senate guy us guys or the house guys the better part of the side of the congress to the house side But I also know we have a hard reality. Every senator has to listen to agriculture because everybody's got ag in their state. But there's truly out of five forty, 44 at the best day out of 435 members have to answer agriculture in the house.

It's easy to pass the farm bill and John's John had the easy part. The house guys had the hard part to pass that. But if we we separate them, guys, there's gonna be no votes on that.

Todd Gleason: Wait. Only 10% of the house

KJ Johnson: On a good day. I would

Todd Gleason: say. Good day.

KJ Johnson: On a good day.

Jonathan Coppess: On a favorable

KJ Johnson: Yeah. And I hate to say this. It's all about counting votes. You gotta count noses at the end of the day, and that's why it makes this all much different. And we can push all that stuff.

But the other thing I see in Farm Bill stuff, and this is just my own personal opinion, there's gonna be a prod. We never get a Farm Bill across the board. Jonathan knows this. He can't answer this, and some of you guys know this. When's the last time we passed the Farm Bill on an odd number year?

That's so the odd number year is not an election year. 1985. We had to have a push of election to get something across the deal to pass something, and we need every vote in the house to get it across the finish line.

Todd Gleason: Wasn't that the year that they did

KJ Johnson: Sidebusters. Okay. CRP. Yeah. And I can't say why what the push was, but that's the last time they passed an odd number Farm Bill.

Todd Gleason: Okay. I suspect some of you have either comments or questions either. Are welcome. Anybody wanna ask a question about policy? A 100% of people have a comment?

Okay. Good.

Brad Stotler: Yep. The 100% of the people like to eat though.

Todd Gleason: Oh, just a comment. That's a comment. Yeah. Just a comment. Yep.

Jonathan Coppess: That is true.

KJ Johnson: Very true, but you still gotta count votes. Yeah. I I totally 100% agree, but you gotta count votes at the end of the day. Right.

Brad Stotler: The dynamics as well is that, so if, you know, in an odd year election, so after the presidential election, if the house I mean, if people I know there's a lot of politics going on for Republicans to retain majorities in both the house and senate. So, politically, people will be watching that. But, if the house were to flip or, you know, what are the priorities gonna be for Democrats? It's gonna be to claw back a lot of things potentially that that they felt that they were, that people didn't work with them on during the reconciliation package. And so you're gonna have a a whipsaw effect going on in congress now around that policy.

Jonathan Coppess: Yeah. And I first off, I I just will not accept that slander on the United States Senate. That's horrible. The one the thing I wanna just touch on with Brad's, because that's true. You're gonna have there there's the whipsaw pressure.

The problem is the dollars we're talking about. Right? You gotta remember, $200,000,000,000 were taken out of snap. So for Democrats to say, hey, we wanna repair or refix or redo it, whatever. In congressional budget rules, unless they get rid of those and come up with something better, which that would be a wonderful start if they did because the budget rules are a mess.

But under the current system, you gotta find 200,000,000,000 somewhere else. And that that money doesn't exist. So the the challenges for anybody to repair it are really big, and that's assuming CBO doesn't think it costs even more than it did to cut, which is likely what's gonna happen. So and I see this guy's a question. I don't wanna ramble too much on the bad nonsense of congressional budgeting, but the mountain is steep.

FAC Attendee: I have more nonsense for you. I I don't get me wrong. Agriculture has been good to me farm for forty plus years. I spent a lot of money on check off dollars we funded new technology improved ag but you doubled your in my career doubled the yields. But we still have bailouts.

We still have tariffs that are ridiculous. We haven't learned anything from history. When I started, Earl Buds, John Block, people like that said, your job is to feed the world. And I took that seriously. But we how do we ever solve this?

I mean, we we we lost USAID and SNAP. And do we ever solve the problem? I mean the education process is there, but nobody's listening in Congress. So it's hard to be optimistic. I feel it's you feel the futility, you talk to other farmers, and and they bought into this.

And now it's it's like, why should I do any of this when all I have to do is wait for another welfare check? So that's my comment. There's a lot of questions in there, and I hope there's some education that goes in there.

Jonathan Coppess: Yeah. I mean, think you raise a really tough point, and and I I said it somewhat sarcastically, but I it is the I wasn't sarcastic. I understand. And it's how I it's I have a thin hold on sanity most days, and so that's that's my mechanism right now. But there is a there begins to be a cycle of this.

Right? And what worries me that we see over and over is payments. Well, those payments didn't work because cost went up, so we gotta add more payments because cost went up and then cost go up, but we had more pay so part of the concern I hear you raising, which is I I share, is that it keeps building on itself. And this if it's a one up type game where congress now sees it has put money in, we're feeding a problem, and we're not solving a problem. So I I agree with you on that.

I think it's a huge concern. But as I've heard, nobody who I will name in this room, as I heard very good point. Right? What are you gonna You're not gonna not take the payment. I mean, they're putting a lot the problem with this policy is you're kind of in a situation that doesn't get easier or better.

And I I don't know what that answer is. So I I agree with your comment about how challenging this is. I worry that a lot of this stuff is, you know, you can run around DC and proclaim how great you are at procuring more payments itself. And some of your other commodity organizations not in the state of Illinois are really active about this, and they are driving a lot of this discussion. And so what may work in a state like Texas may not be the ideal situation for a state like Illinois.

And you're kinda getting dragged through that with them. And I think that's problematic, but I'll stop there because

Brad Stotler: We are sharing that we are sharing sentiments with our our legislators about the idea of of these payments to Jonathan's points, they're gonna be taken, but the prices of inputs are staying high. How is that, if there's not a reflection of lower input costs because of lower commodity prices? And so a lot of this becomes, you know, in the farmer's hand and then to a supplier. And so we are sharing those sentiments with lawmakers. And I think as you all, you know, however you personally feel about some of this, and I think when you're talking to lawmakers, have to at least, be honest and talk about that point as well.

KJ Johnson: I'll take my point. I totally agree with you, but I will say it starts with redistricting. Scott, I think Indiana did a great thing yesterday Yeah. And said we're not gonna redistrict. If we the other thing I look at, and I'll I'll argue with anybody.

All primary or everything in Illinois is on a primary. It is not on a general election. Tell me tell me one seat in Illinois, congressional seat, that is truly a fifty fifty seat that's gonna flip back for it. It's all about the primary. And that is redistricting.

We have become harder on hard right and hard left. I will tell you the other thing is, and this I'll go off the soapbox, but members aren't talking to each other. They're not having dinners. You guys talk about backroom deals and all that, but that's where that's where trust is made. And members aren't having trust to trust with each other anymore.

That's, that's that's what I've seen over the last twenty years. We have went away from the trust of can you talk to each other? And that's that's bad, but it's a lot about redistricting. We go back to I don't see fair map. There's nothing fair.

But open seats in the general elections, we'll go back to the center and try and work some this stuff out. But if we get more divided and gonna go just to a republican district or, democratic district, we ain't gonna move some of this stuff.

Todd Gleason: Comments or questions out here? One last policy thing. The president talked about this when he was talking about the bridge payments earlier this week, and it was on manufacturing and regulations. What do we know as it's related to easing off on the regulations? Anything and whether EPA might be involved and that was what we got was

Jonathan Coppess: I mean, my guess is and I don't know. KJ is probably closer to this than than it's gonna be EPA. So pulling back environmental regulations is absolutely a priority of the administration. But it's also, dare I say, a lot of marketing, for lack of a better word. I think it's a lot of how do we get through this moment, this new cycle, this problem we've created.

So we're gonna say this thing, and then tomorrow to be the other thing. And and so I I don't I don't know. I mean, you see the news this week, China now topped a trillion dollars in trade surplus. Manufacturing jobs are down. Like, we're looking at, again, a series of problems we're not solving.

And so, you know, I think a lot of this is throwing convenient talking points at a problem. But I would if anything happens, it's gonna be, it it'll be environmental regulations.

Todd Gleason: Any final word from each of you before we make it to the way our way to I did not expect this to go this way, by the way. I I had I really did not. Sorry. That's fine.

Brad Stotler: Well, Todd, you left it wide open on the on the agenda.

Todd Gleason: So I did. Yeah. I did. No. I purposely left it wide open on the agenda because I like to see where things go.

KJ Johnson: I said it earlier, but I'm gonna say it again. We always talk national issues. But guys, you need you need to focus on a lot of state issues. There's more stuff. I will everything's local.

The county board probably has more say over you than what the national does. The state has more than the national does. But there's a lot of state issues on agriculture that we need to be watching. And I again, usually, get kind of nine out of 10 times. It's on national news, but we need to watch what's going on at the state.

FAC Attendee: It's not local for here, but can you talk a little bit about the Iowa concern about water quality?

KJ Johnson: I am not the best one to to talk on that. I'll just say but, I cannot remember the guy's name from Des Moines Water Works. Bill Stowe.

Todd Gleason: What's what's his name?

Brad Stotler: Bill Stowe.

KJ Johnson: Bill Stowe. He has has passed away, but a lot of that has definitely quiet down. We're not hearing near as much stuff out of Iowa what we used to. Good, bad, or indifference. I just tell you, you don't hear nears of I think we are working on stuff here.

We're going in the right direction, you're not hearing near as much as what you had ten years ago when I first started with IFCA. Early on.

Jonathan Coppess: Question. I'm not in the business of speculating on what the supreme court's up to, but it is I don't it in my mind, it could be the other elephant in the room. Right? You know, we've heard all summer that any sort of economic assistance is gonna be coming off of tariff revenue. Right?

But though that tariff revenue is under challenge currently, you know, what what do you see happening if the supreme court comes back with that more extreme decision to, you know, refund tariff revenue? That is a great question and a very difficult so prognosticating about the Supreme Court is maybe only slightly less difficult than some of the other things. My guess if I had to guess, the Supreme Court will strike down the use of IEPA, the International Economic Emergency something act Protection Act. Protection Act. But we'll probably find a way to navigate between having to make repayments, and then I presume they've got backup plans of other statutes they're gonna use to continue the tariff policy.

Because I don't think the administration's gonna relent on tariff policy anytime soon. So I think you kinda get into a whack a mole situation of, okay. Can't use that statute, so now use this statute.

Brad Stotler: These these payments though too are under the CCC authorization, and so it wouldn't impact these these recent discussions around the 12,000,000,000 that's coming to farmers. So so those payments are paid not through tariff income. They're paid for under a different reauthor a different a different authorization in congress. So it wouldn't impact the recent announcement on the 11,000,000,000 coming to farmers by February.

KJ Johnson: Don't wanna add anything, but I want I on that issue, but talking about Supreme Court. Everything you guys need to be watching, the bear lawsuit with Supreme Court. Because that is gonna directly affect how pesticides look into the future. That is a huge case. I don't know if you guys saw the solicitor general ask the supreme court to take up that case.

And it pretty much says, in a nutshell, if EPA approves that pesticide that it is safe, that is it. Because I don't know if you guys have known bears spent well, this is a couple months ago. $66,000,000,000 to defend ground up. That is a huge issue, and it doesn't getting a whole lot of talk, but if the, Supreme Court doesn't take up that case, I I hate to see what happens with the bear.

Todd Gleason: Give them a nice round of applause. Thank you. KJ Johnson is with the Illinois Fertilizer and Chemical Association. Jonathan Kopp is with the University of Illinois, and Brad Stottler is from the Illinois Corn Growers Association. You've been listening to a presentation made during the twenty twenty five Farm Assets Conference held in Bloomington at the AGRICenter.

I'm University of Illinois Extension's Todd Gleeson.