Cease and Desist on the Foreclosures: The Ball is in Your Court, Mr. Vilsack

We are living in curious times. Sometimes the left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing. Sometimes that lack of information is part of a sadistic plan. Sometimes it's incompetence. 

Under the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021, section 1005 lined out $4B in debt relief to a group known as Socially Disadvantaged Farmers and Ranchers, a designation that has been around since 1990. Section 1006 prescribed $1.01B for outreach, training, education, technical assistance, grants, and loans as well as other matters. 

Then, the white farmers across the country decided the the designation of "Socially Disadvantaged Farmers and Ranchers," or 2501 of the 1990 Farm Bill, was unconstitutional. Their lawsuits, some 13 of them at last glance, stopped in its tracks the effort to relieve the indebtedness of historically mistreated farmers. In a recent post on this page, I jumped into the USDA data base and showed how the first six white litigants, including the ag commissioner of the State of Texas, benefited via three pots of money to the tune of over $523,000 and that the counties of those six litigants benefitted to the tune of $1.2B+. They are claiming reverse discrimination when the stats point out how white farmers have always had the upper hand in terms of subsidies, coronavirus relief funds, and the bailout from Trump's failed tariff war with China. 

Provisions of the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 were rewritten in the Reconciliation Bill of 2021 such that even white farmers, who have not been historically mistreated, would also receive debt relief. Whites gain advantages off of Black suffering is the way folks say it with whom I hang out. 

Earlier this year a moratorium was placed on debt collections and foreclosures. You can read that release here. 

But now, while we are waiting for the Senate to work its magic on the Reconciliation Bill, and as we wait to see what Manchin out of West Virginia is going to do, several egregious things are happening at the county level. Farms are being foreclosed on, loans are being accelerated, liens are being placed on crops, and other acts of malfeasance. For instance, a Black farmer has loans to plant and harvest his peanut and cotton crops. He owes the USDA some money and knows that he'll find debt relief around the corner, or at least he hopes so. 

In a magic slight of hand, the company buying the Black farmer's crop has placed a lien on it. This is apparently at the request of the local county office. My questions are several. What right was it of this company to know what the farmer owed? What collaborative gig was set up such that the FSA gets the first dibs on the farmer's money. Did the farmer know about this possibility? The local county office has in some way, shape, or form, realized that this particular grain company is going to process that particular farmer's particular crop and found a way to put a lien on. This means that once the farmer has had his crop sold, the money will go not to him, but to the FSA and put against the loan. This smells like a rat. 

So, there is a moratorium. It reads like this: if you  have a direct loan, the USDA will work with you and will not foreclose on you. The USDA will not accelerate your loans. See the final sentence in Senator Reverend Warnock's letter to Secretary Vilsack below. He is quoting USDA that there will be no adverse actions taken upon any farmer who does not make payments while the debt relief thing is being resolved. There you have it. What USDA said in DC, a local FSA office can undermine. How much sense does that make? Who's guarding the hen house? A bunch of foxes? You know what I mean. 

But then, here comes the foreclosure notice, here comes the loan acceleration notice, here comes the lien on your crops. Here comes all manner of things that the USDA said would not happen. Those decisions are being made at the county level. 

We have advised various Senators as to these shenanigans. One of those Senators has written a strong letter to Secretary Vilsack to call off his dogs. Here is what Senator Reverend Warnock writes: 

"In March 2021, President Biden signed the American Rescue Plan Act into law. This legislation includes targeted debt relief payments aimed at remedying USDA’s well-documented history of racial discrimination. As USDA prepared to implement this legislation, it told eligible farmers that they would not be subject to punishment for failing to make payments on forgivable debts. On a public-facing website regarding the American Rescue Plan Act debt relief payments, USDA states “USDA is not taking any adverse actions on any eligible borrower who does not make payments” on Farm Service Agency direct loans or farm storage facility loans." This letter was signed on December 10, 2021. 

We are also in the process of gathering data across the country. We want to know whether or not this is happening just to Black farmers, and in what counties, and in what states. We want to know what other acts of malfeasance are being done to them. The data is being collected as we speak. 

A lot of people are mad. A lot of people have every right in the world not to trust the USDA. These actions justify that anger and mistrust, if we ever needed more justifications. 

White people, even white employees of the USDA, want to believe these types of actions are sporadic. Wrong. Remember the words, "systemic racism," "systemic discrimination," the system is at fault and the people who stand there with their hands in their pockets. 

And we don't. Plain and simple. Period. Full stop. Period. 

Black Belt Justice Center Press Statement

Black Belt Justice Center Press Statement

June 16, 2021

 Press Inquiries:

 

Contact: Tracy Lloyd McCurty, Esq., Executive Director, Black Belt Justice Center and Co-Organizer of the Black Farmers’ Appeal: Cancel Pigford Debt Campaign

Email: tmccurty@blackbeltjustice.org 

Phone: (202) 486-9857

Linktree: https://linktr.ee/acresofancestry

 

The U.S. Department of Justice should vigorously defend Section 1005 of the American Rescue Plan Act, a historic piece of legislation that provides $5B in debt cancellation and related aid to Black, Indigenous, Latino, Asian, and farmers of color. However, it is important to understand the origin and historical context of the American Rescue Plan Act. The debt cancellation language was inspired from the Justice for Black Farmers Act of 2021, which provides debt cancellation, federal and state tax relief, and the return of offsets to Black farmers who participated in the disastrous 1999 Pigford v. Glickman (Pigford I) class action racial discrimination lawsuit.

 

The Pigford I lawsuit left the vast majority of Black farmers, over 22,000, in unconscionable debt, threat of foreclosure, and no legal recourse to save their family farms. Back then, the Department of Justice spent 56,000 staff attorney hours and $12M contesting Black farmers on their discrimination claims after the Black farmers’ attorneys gave up discovery.[1] Many of us feel strongly that the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) once again engaged in obstructionism and sabotage to deny expedient recovery to the remaining Black legacy farmers holding on to their family farms. While reading the judge’s order, we were shocked to read that USDA had sent offer letters to 8,580 farmers and had already started to forgive loans. We don’t know of any Black farmers that received offer letters from USDA.

 

According to USDA data, only 2,000 out of the 17,000 farmers of color with direct loans with USDA are Black/African American and less than 5% of all Black farmers will receive debt cancellation. We have been grappling with these devastating numbers and the theft of Black farmlands by USDA through the Pigford I lawsuit. Given USDA’s abysmal track record on civil rights and our collective memory of pervasive (and persistent) anti-Black racism within the local FSA offices and county committee system, we opposed USDA being in charge of the implementation process and advocated for the appointment of an independent ombudsman.  A colleague reminded us, “it is always going to be ‘all deliberate speed’ if it’s on white supremacy’s time.”

 

Over the last twenty years, the vast majority of our legacy farmers who suffered under crushing debts with USDA were either foreclosed on or forced to take out loans with private banks to pay off debts with USDA. For example, last month we spoke to the children of Pigford legacy farmer Janie Bell Bembry from Hawkinsville, GA. Ms. Bembry transitioned early this year. Back in 2011, USDA initiated foreclosure proceedings against the family farm, forcing the family to take out a loan with a private bank to pay the unconscionable debt with USDA. The family still owes over $100K and will not be eligible for debt cancellation under the American Rescue Plan Act.

 

¹Environmental Working Group and the National Black Farmers Association. 2004. “Obstruction of Justice: USDA Undermines Historic Civil Rights Settlement With Black Farmers.” Available at https://www.ewg.org/research/obstruction-justice.

 

Gut Punch: Too Many Deaths

This morning I had one of those gut-punch moments. It was a serious punch to my heart and soul. My grief is intense, and maybe it will remit as the day goes on. I hope so. Actually, I hope it doesn't. It is too deep. 

Several of us have been working with various congressional leaders and Secretary Tom Vilsack's office on behalf of Black farmers and their severe mistreatment at the hands of the USDA. Those people have been Senators Warren, Sanders, and Booker. We engaged with President Biden's policy team before the election. We have made calls, written letters, and helped write legislation. 

Socially Disadvantaged Farmers are on the precipice of a dream come true. Indebtedness that has been a function of discriminatory actions for years, as interest piled up upon interest, now has an opportunity to be erased. The term is "debt relief," which carries with it some technicalities. 

Several years ago, I interviewed a couple of Black farmers who had had their land and equipment taken from them via a contrived arrangement of the FSA office, a local bank, and the implement dealership. Those folks knew that foreclosure was coming before it landed in the laps of the farmers. 

One farmer died not long after I interviewed him. It was a short interview as he was in his hospital bed in his living room as his care taker hovered nearby. I made it brief. I had moved into his space and he was suffering. He was soon in the presence of his ancestors. 

This morning, I decided to call the other farmer. I was thinking that perhaps provisions for debt relief under the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021, with its sections 1005 and 1006, might be useful for him and his wife. I knew that they were indebted to the USDA, but how much I don't recall. 

Then, upon doing a google search, I received the sucker punch. This farmer had died earlier this year. Yes, he also had passed on to his ancestors, just like his partner had several years ago. I watched the video of him and his family there on the web page, and I wept. 

Those tears are for him and his wife and family. Those tears are for numerous other Black farmers who did not live to see justice. From Texas to North Carolina to Georgia to Kansas and to points betwixt and between, they are dead. Yes, they have died, and in many instances, the stress of farming while Black in  America took them to early graves. I see their names, I hear their voices, their documents are in my filing cabinet, their interviews are in my voice files and transcribed in most places. 

They passed to glory without seeing justice, without seeing their debts forgiven. 

I left a message on their home phone. I hope his wife will call. If she doesn't, I still was able to leave a word of condolence. 

Yes, the Black Farmer Movement is real and the farmers are worthy of justice for their pain and suffering. Yes, their families deserve debt relief that they never received. 

That is my commitment, to work on their behalf, before any more Black farmers die. 

Too many have died. 

Therein lies my grief.