It is Time for Your Conscience to Interfere

November 13, 2024

President Joe Biden
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20050
 
Vice President Kamala Harris
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20050

The outcome of the election was certainly not what any of us expected. Just maybe your staff will recognize our names as we have written you on numerous occasions. We have sent a host of letters to you individually or collectively on 14 occasions, White House staff on 8 occasions, Secretary Vilsack on 12 occasions, and congressionals on multiple occasions as well. Our issues and concerns have been consistent and ignored.

However, given the time you have left in your administration, there are some important issues that we would like to discuss with you before the next Trump administration takes over. Perhaps you know of these matters because South Georgia went to the Republicans partially because of Black farmers.

In a lead-up to the election we had provocative conversations with Dr. Cornel West and Dr. Jill Stein. Our issues were important enough that they agreed to be interviewed by us on “Justice for Black Farmers” and “Seeking Truth and Justice,” the Marti Oakley Podcast Radio Show on Blog Talk Radio.

As we have written to you recently on August 21, 2024 and on October 24, 2024, there is a large number of items that are extremely important to us. These matters cut across very important areas in your administration: Black farmers primarily across the South and rural America. We are not convinced that your offices clearly understand the pain and suffering that has taken place on the farms and in the communities where Black farmers and their families reside.

We have long supported the Democratic party as it has been historically more supportive of our efforts than has the Republican party and we have still been punished. We can point to the Bill Clinton administration as the time when we experienced the most support and got things done.

It is time for your conscience to interfere. As we have said to your administration many times that “Tom Vilsack runs USDA like a plantation”……giving millions of tax payer dollars to those who agree with him and leaving the county committee system in place that has been known for decades to be the death knell for struggling Black farmers. The county committee system is a major indicator of this administration’s complicity in the demise of Black farmers and so many others. We have seen how Vilsack used his equity commission and its member organizations to justify leaving in place the county committee system process.

We warned you of the failed Vilsack political agenda using the race card. You were told by others that the continuation of Vilsack’s failed political agenda was not working and it played out in real time in Georgia, Virginia, North Carolina, and elsewhere in the Southern region during the 2024 election cycle.

The “go along to get along” strategy was thought to have been working until election day 2024. Dr. Eddie Glaude, Jr., Princeton University professor has clearly stated that using race/identity politics and more to control has failed on so many levels for our nation to see. Yes, it failed on election day 2024.

In view of the Republicans again taking the White House and not knowing what the administration change will mean to the US Department of Agriculture (USDA), we are taking our cues from Dr. Eddie Glaude, Jr., professor at Princeton when he states, “This is us,” and Donald Trump, “he is the manifestation of the ugliness within us.”

Some may think we are too demanding given the fact that your administration is soon to conclude; however, we are reminded of Dr. King’s letter from the Birmingham jail when he said that for Black people, wait means never. The critique that the white ministers had of him was that he was moving too fast, that he needed to slow down, to do things incrementally. His quote, “justice too long delayed is justice denied.” From 1910 to 1997, Black farmers have lost approximately $326B from the loss of land and potential income. In 1920, 950,000 Black farmers operated farms. In 1910, Black farmers owned over 19,000,000 acres of land. Now, there are approximately 30,136 Black-owned farms of approximately 3,245,991 acres. There is immense pain that comes from the loss of their land and the generational wealth that will not go to their children and grandchildren. Yes, a few Black farmers received funds under the “distressed borrower” clause of the Inflation Reduction Act and some received funds under the discrimination section of the IRA, but we believe that is too little given their pain and suffering.

Time is growing short. We feel the burden of the clock ticking. Therefore, we would like to meet with you to discuss three large matters:  1) Black land loss and the USDA; 2) pain and suffering of Black farmers and their families; and 3) fixing the systemic institutional racism at USDA and the need there for new leadership, systemic change, transparency, accountability, and justice.

Both the USDA Coalition of Minority Employees and the Justice for Black Farmers Group would like to meet with you and other Black farmers and their advocates as did President Bill Clinton in the White House. He was effective in developing a plan with not only the problems but with implementing the solutions.

We weep on each occasion when we read the names of the Black farmers who have died early in the fight against racism within the halls of USDA as they poured body, mind, and spirit into saving their land and livelihood. Countless women and men have died all too early because racism with it weight and burden is all too heavy to bear. And so the words to the Bob Dylan classic, “Blowin’ in the Wind,” ring all too true, especially the question, “How many deaths will it take ‘til we know that too many people have died?” The answer comes, “The answer my friend is blowin’ in the wind. The answer is blowin’ in the wind.”

We are the voice of the voiceless. Too many people have died.

We look forward to hearing from you.

Respectfully,

---S---

Lawrence Lucas
President Emeritus, USDA Coalition for Minority Employees
Representative, Justice for Black Farmers Group
https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100064681597169
www.blackmeninAmerica.com
LawrLCL@aol.com
856-910-2399

 ---S---

Waymon R. Hinson, Ph.D.
Representative, USDA Coalition of Minority Employees
Representative, Justice for Black Farmers Group
www.letjusticering.blogspot.com
Psychologist
Waymon.hinson@gmail.com
903-271-4654

 

Jesus, Lord, Come This Way

          ,

       

Jesus,  

            Surely you see this mess

            That we are in

            And know the stress

            And its roots in sin,

Is that so?

Jesus,

            You left some lofty place

            That is far beyond my eyes

            To come into this troubled space

            As we head downhill to our own demise,

Is that so?

Jesus,

            You cast your lot with us                                

            You pitched your tent here

            What do you make of all this fuss

            And the people who die year after year

For decades centuries?

Jesus,

            From your other worldly view

            Surely you see Black people lynched

            Dead on arrival at the hospital

            Because a cop’s knee his neck pinched

And drained his life before our eyes?

Jesus,

            Our people are enraged                                             

            Our people are mourning

            As this war is waged

            With plenty of warning.

What about that pain and suffering?

Jesus,

            You walked and traversed

             Lots of miles beneath the sun            

             People saw you and cursed

             At you and the stories you spun

To what ultimate good?

Jesus,

            People who look like me

            Carry guns and offer threats

            Hanging that effigy from that tree

            When said and done, any regrets

By those folks?

Jesus,

            That young man dead

            Hunted like a deer or rabbit

            By men racism inbred

            Hatred their deadly habit.

Is it so?

Jesus,

            If you were to come again                                                    

            And live amongst us once more

            Could we say thank you and amen

            Or would you close the door

Are we too beyond hope?

Jesus,

            You saved her from the religious

            You kept her from dying

            From rocks and the prestigious

            Pompous cruel lots of folks crying.

Do you see the connections?

Jesus,

            You talked to her by the well

            You told the truth about her life

            Racism simply aside fell

            She was not somebody’s wife.

And you forgave her sins?

Jesus,

            You who faced the angry mobs

            Your human body did hang from the tree

            Can you hear our painful sobs

            Do you feel our frequent pleas

For respite from the pain?

Jesus,

            And that gives me hope

            For a brighter day and time

            When no longer is a rope

            A gun a knee the answer until then I’m

Going to pray grieve and shout

Help my corner of the world turn itself around

And know racism and what it’s about

Is just another deadly ungodly sound

That neither you nor I nor them can bear.

Jesus,

            We want to hear

            And live not in fear

            Shedding another one more one more tear

            While on this planet rear

Our children.

Jesus,

            Save us we plead

            We have made the world a mess

            Our hateful selfish harmful evil deed

            Racism our greatest sin we do confess.

Jesus, 

            And one more thing before I go

            It's surely something you already know

            This land of ours is about to decide

            That one person might heal our divide

But I'm not so sure. 

Jesus, 

            Some have seemingly sold their souls

            To the white guy with his talk and curses real loud

            While she speaks words of joy and points up ahead

            She prays, sings, and laughs as we hold on by a thread.

Jesus, 

            And so it is done, and tears fill our eyes.

            America has made her choice.

            Character no longer matters to those who have a voice

            And the crooked guy takes the prize with all his lies. 

So I linger in deferred hope for this land. 

           

Jesus,

            Please forgive

            Please forgive

            Please forgive

            Please forgive

           

Dear VIce President Harris: Can We Talk?

October 24, 2024

Vice President Kamala Harris
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue
Washington, DC 20050

We represent the USDA Coalition of Minority Employees and the Justice for Black Farmers Group, and we have done so since our beginning with the United States Agriculture (USDA) in 1994 as we have advocated for Black farmers as well as for women within the institution who are being mistreated.

Our motivations for contacting you are simple. Vice President Harris, you have the President’s ear in these final days, and you have much influence with the American people and various subgroups want your support and for that, you get their votes.

We have had two in-depth conversations/interviews with Drs. Cornel West and Jill Stein. As you know, they are candidates for the presidency in 2024. We just talked a few weeks ago to Dr. Stein in Philadelphia regarding widespread abuses at the USDA. Both of them expressed a deep concern about the lack of leadership, accountability, transparency, oversight, and justice which are lacking at the USDA. We wish to hear the same from the two of you.

We recognize within a few short weeks that the people will have spoken and you, VP Harris, stand an excellent chance at being our next president. In these unprecedented times, much is demanded of our public servants, perhaps more than at most any time in the history of our country. This letter, then, will provide the justification for our list of asks.

Black farmers’ skepticism of President Biden remains entrenched and as his VP, some of that follows you. And, our opposition to the President appointing Vilsack goes back to the very beginning.

As we wrote in our most recent letter to you and President Biden on August 16, 2024, our message has been consistent since our inception in 1994 as the USDA Coalition of Minority Employees. From the earlies stages of our communications with Vilsack in 2011, the White House, staffers, and others, our message has been clear and our list of concerns lengthy and legitimate. In fact, a lengthier list is found in correspondence with President Biden in 2022 in which we advocated for systemic change.

We have previously chronicled some crucial historical points, beginning with Senator Elizabeth Warren during her campaign for the presidency, and the development of her policy to address Black land loss, racism, USDA’s failures, and a myriad of other matters in a document that became the standard bearer for the promotion of justice for Black farmers.

Several senators including Elizabeth Warren, Cory Booker, and Raphael Warnock succeeded in writing and submitting to the Senate an important piece of legislation, The Justice for Black Farmers Act.  It marked the significance of historical issues and mistreatment of Black farmers.

We have found the White House and the USDA to be closed systems, closed to us in particular in our efforts to address the concerns noted above to the officials who have the influence to take corrective measures. Secretary Vilsack ignored us except for one unsatisfactory meeting via technology as has President Biden. Only Cedric Richmond and William T. McIntee, in the Office of Public Engagement gave us a fair hearing.

We participated with the agriculture transition team, learned that it was steered by Tom Vilsack, and were informed eventually that what we were seeking was unconstitutional. Next came the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (ARPA) that brought about the banking industry’s complaints and a slow walking process by Secretary Vilsack that allowed twelve frivolous and racist lawsuits to be filed by white farmers alleging reverse discrimination. See those details here.

With the passage of the ARPA, we celebrated with Senators Warnock, Warren, and Booker and numerous Black farmers and members of the USDA Coalition of Minority Employees and the Justice for Black Farmers group, but our celebration was short lived and the courts and the white farmer cases stymied our progress.

Senators Raphael Warnock and Cory Booker have in the past shown their interest and concerns regarding the continued abuse at USDA; however, in the past few years because of their busy schedules and political obligations, they have been prevented from doing what is really needed at USDA…..to put the Department into “receivership.” The reason is that USDA is not properly carrying out or implementing its own rules and regulations. The decades of failures regarding Black farmers and abuse of women employees at the US Forest Service, has been long documented at USDA, in the Congress, and nationwide.

Next, Congress passed the race neutral Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 which allocated $3.1B for “distressed borrowers” who could be of any race or gender and their debts would be brought to zero. Additionally, a sum of $2.2B was allocated for farmers who could prove that they had experienced discrimination, regardless of race, color, creed, national origin, and gender. We critiqued this bill and its outcomes quite intensely in a letter to the President. The process proved to be laborious but ultimately approximately $1.76B was allocated to Black farmers and the remainder to others.

The process was laborious and complicated, some farmers died before they could see any benefits from the lengthy chain of events and entities. Relatively few of our friends received any benefits as it appears that the few who did were hand-picked by the USDA.

So, that is where we are with regard to finances. However, the saga continues with other matters, and we would like to outline them for you.

We know of zero Black farmers meeting with the President though we do know of a few who have met with FSA Director, Zach Ducheneaux. Their voices are important and unheard.

A significant piece of research found that between 1910 and 1997, Black farmers losses amounted to approximately $326B. Those losses will never be made up. In terms of the pandemic relief funding of billions of dollars, only 0.1% went to Black farmers. This is one example of the many burdens placed upon our Black farmers in rural America.

Various studies from within the federal government have validated what we believe, that inadequacies impact all of us. In November, 2023, the General Accounting Office (GAO) provided a scathing rebuke of the internal tracking system for complaints. The Office of the Inspector General (OIG) reported in September, 2021 that the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights was failing to process complaints in a timely manner and potential circumvention of the law. A recent doctoral dissertation provided a negative evaluation of the county committee system, one which continues to be protected by Secretary Vilsack.

Secretary Vilsack refuses to provide information about loans and services by race, asserting that to do so would be illegal, despite two Farm Bills that demand the collection and dispersal of this information. We know globally but not specifically these numbers.

Various investigative reports “The Machine that Eats up Black Farmland,” by Joyce, Rosenberg, and Stucki; ”Forced Off Their Land,” by Holloway; and “How USDA Distorted Data to Conceal Decades of Discrimination Against Black Farmers,” by Rosenberg and Stucki; and numerous internal and external reports, accumulated by the Environmental Working Group, all tell the tragedies of white farmers being advantaged in all areas by comparison to Black farmers. These matters of racism and injustice have been occurring under the current administration as well as that of Obama, Bush, Clinton, and previous administrations for decades. The USDA acts as if it is a law to themselves and fails at too many levels to display transparency, accountability, and a commitment to removing racism from its halls and offices. The Equity Commission of Vilsack and the failures of the County Committee system are two that are most obvious to us.

While this is merely the tip of the iceberg for us as advocates, we have not been silent nor invisible. We have written numerous letters to the White House, the USDA, and to others. We have published many letters in various open forums. Perhaps you know that on March 1, 2023, a large number of us demonstrated in front of the White House with placards, signs, and megaphones.  

We, therefore, have several asks of you, Vice President Harris. We hear you say that you are not afraid of good ideas and that you will not shy away from them. Here, therefore, are our issues to discuss with you and/or your top advisors.

Work together with us and meet with us as have Drs. West and Stein;

Place USDA at the top of your list of priorities and create practical options for rural America and Black farmers;

Hear and validate the pain and suffering of Black farmers and families; 

Address the problems within the Office of Civil Rights and compel the office to settle complaints of Black farmers that are languishing there;

Appoint a new Secretary within your administration, one with the trust of Black farmers and other advocates;

Compel USDA to develop a course of action that eliminates sexism and sexual assaults and other abuses experienced by women in the forestry division, Western Region; 

Compel USDA to develop a course of action that eliminates racism and unfair practices that disadvantage Black farmers and favor white farmers; 

Compel USDA to develop processes that create justice, accountability, and transparency throughout the Department; and 

Require the leadership within USDA address the area in which most discrimination occurs, the Farm Service Administration at the county committee level. 

Many African Americans in urban America are only one or two generations away from the farm in rural America and it is important to know the deep connections between the two. Some of us feel forgotten because of the extensive focus on urban America. To begin to address these matters even prior to the election would make a dramatic statement to our people. Black farmers and families are rural America.

 

We follow you and your campaign closely and appreciate the town halls that you have been in including the one on CNN last night. We understand your time constraints as you travel and speak over the next two weeks. Therefore, we request an immediate conversation with one of your closest advisors, Cedric Richmond, to discuss our issues and concerns relative to Black and minority farmers and abused women within USDA and larger systemic issues.  

We stand available to answer any and all of your questions and assist you in this regard. Many Black farmers and their advocates feel abandoned by our Black leadership in Washington and in rural America. We are “the voice of the voiceless.”

Respectfully,

---S---

Lawrence Lucas
President Emeritus, USDA Coalition for Minority Employees
Representative, Justice for Black Farmers Group
https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100064681597169
www.blackmeninAmerica.com
LawrLCL@aol.com
856-910-2399 

 ---S---

Waymon R. Hinson, Ph.D.
Representative, USDA Coalition of Minority Employees
Representative, Justice for Black Farmers Group
www.letjusticering.blogspot.com
Psychologist
Waymon.hinson@gmail.com
903-271-4654

 

 

A Few Annotations as to Why Biden's Nomination is a Bad One for Black Farmers

The following links and comments are all pertinent to the Vilsack nomination for Ag Secretary by President-Elect Joe Biden. As much as I wanted trump out and Biden in, and as much as I wanted Perdue out as Ag Secretary, this decision is a clear betrayal of rural America, Black America, and Black farmers. Joe Biden can do better. I am not convinced that he was fully informed ahead of time as to the baggage that Vilsack bore. If he didn't he should have. Those who vetted Vilsack did not do a good job of vetting, or, Mr. Biden simply ignored the obvious. We will not stop even though his nomination is in place. We will fight even if he is confirmed, but we will also advocate for justice until we have no more breath in our bodies.  

https://www.motherjones.com/food/2020/12/biden-vilsack-usda-agriculture-shirley-sherrod/

Vilsack is the same guy who worked under President Obama for two terms. He is pro-big ag at the expense of small family farms, his support of corporate interests rather than workers in the meat packing industry, his support of pesticides at the expense of peoples' health, and his woeful narrative around civil rights for Black farmers and women employees is criminal. 

https://thecounter.org/tom-vilsack-biden-usda-civil-rights-betrayal-lawrence-lucas/

This article gets personal. Lawrence Lucas and I have become partners in the effort on behalf of Black farmers. We talk several times a week. I have listened to him, and he has listened to me, and we have supported each other during the heavy days of the effort. He led the way to push back against Elizabeth Warren's support of the heirs property factor as key to land loss. She listened to us, developed an expansive Black farmer policy, and spearheaded The Justice for Black Farmers Act of 2020 before handing it off to Cory Booker. Lawrence was at the helm of that movement. I have watched him work. I have experienced my grief and angst alongside his. You will find his narrative of betrayal deeply compelling. 

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/12/09/black-farmers-tom-vilsack-agriculture-usda-biden-cabinet-444077

You'll find several of my friends quoted in this article. You'll find several quoted who will appear in the Black farmer documentary. Yes, we are seething over this nomination. 

https://thecounter.org/usda-black-farmers-discrimination-tom-vilsack-reparations-civil-rights/

This expose by Nate Rosenberg and Bryce Stucki reveals the truth behind the Vilsack administration. No, the Vilsack administration did not settle scores of civil rights complaints. No, civil rights complaints did not fall to an all-time low. No, the USDA did not reduce disparities between Black and white farmers. No, the number of Black farmers did not increase. No, the Pigford Settlement did not close a painful chapter in the USDA's history of discrimination. 

LETTER TO THE BIDEN/HARRIS CAMPAIGN

 LETTER TO THE BIDEN/HARRIS CAMPAIGN

September 16, 2020

Subject: Discovery of Significant Information

Only days after we released our “Open Letter to Vice President Joe Biden,” September 6, 2020, we received a copy of the letter from the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law dated January 9, 2009. We were shocked that this letter affirms the legitimacy of the work that we have been trying to accomplish with the Biden/Harris campaign for months.

 This letter clearly highlights a legacy of discriminatory actions by the US Department of Agriculture (USDA). These include areas of farm loans and benefit programs along with “outright displays of bias against minorities and minorities and women, especially in the county-level offices of USDA.” Given this legacy within the USDA and its challenges, the committee made four recommendations: “(1) a moratorium on foreclosures against minority and women farmers with pending complaints, (2) a requirement that county office interactions with farmers be documented; (3) a mandate to generate better data on socially disadvantaged farmers: and (4) establishment of a minority farmer advisory committee,” all of which were spelled out in the 2008 farm bill. If the administrations had followed the edicts of the farm bill, many of the problems of USDA civil rights would have been resolved.

The author of the letter concludes, “It is appalling that any American today should still face the kind of entrenched discrimination at the hands of a Federal government agency that minorities and women face when dealing with the USDA.” The author predicts that “unless the foreclosure moratorium is implemented immediately, more of these farmers will lose their farms.”

The problem is we have too many sitting in a room planning the destruction of other peoples’ lives instead of improving them. Where was the rush to fix the problems addressed in this letter....by the Vilsack administration?

We absolutely agree with the Lawyers’ Committee addressing key strategies for changing the systemic racial and gender inequality at the USDA. History tells us that their appeal landed on deaf ears. President after president, congress after congress, secretary after secretary, and lastly, election after election, civil rights at USDA remains dysfunctional. Our demands for justice at USDA are further justified as a result of this letter.

We appealed to the Biden/Harris Campaign to adopt the civil rights fixes in the Warren and Sanders plans. However, after many months of meetings this recommendation was not taken seriously. To add salt to the wound, you stated that our request to address Black farmer issues was unconstitutional.

The Biden/Harris Campaign shows an unwillingness to address issues that could change the course of USDA. Warren and Sanders listened to Black farmers, urban farmers, and their advocates and produced comprehensive strategies that would fix USDA civil rights once and for all. They seemed to have understood the gravity of the injustices done to Black farmers. They understood the need for systemic changes at USDA…. not putting a band-aid on a cancer.

We want the Biden/Harris Campaign to implement the recommendations per the Lawyers’ Committee as well as the Warren and Sanders Plans.

That said:

·         What actions will you be taking regarding this newly surfaced letter from the Lawyers Committee?

·         What is the relevance/connection in USDA 2009 and today’s USDA’s civil rights?

·         What impact, if any, does the Lawyers Committee letter have on your “plan” for fixing systemic discrimination at USDA?

This widespread racism and sexism have become a social justice issue which cannot be side-stepped with your sudden silence. Is your silence the punishment for speaking the truth regarding USDA civil rights?

This is our appeal for justice, dignity, and respect. This is for the living and for those who died waiting for justice from USDA.

Black Lives Matter,

Lawrence Lucas, President Emeritus

USDA Coalition of Minority Employees

www.agcoalition.org

Justice for Black Farmers

justice4bf@gmail.com

856-910-2399

CC: Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law

        Others

Worlds Still Colliding

This morning my wife and I do what we normally do on Sunday mornings at our house. We worship online with our church family here in Denison, then we listened in on our old church home in Ada, OK, and then we enjoyed the worshipful music from The Hills Church in Ft. Worth, and then wrapped it up with an old, old church of ours, the Highland Church in Memphis, TN. We don't always do that much worship time with other churches, but we did today and it was rich.

Why am I sharing this with you? Here's why. I found myself terribly preoccupied with what is going on in the world, brutality, injustices of all sorts, BLM movement and who loves it and who despises it, and other things. I was especially burdened by what is happening on the political scene. Our current president does not have a civil rights plan, and he does not have a workable plan for farmers, nothing for small family farms of our land and especially nothing for Black farmers of our land. We have hope with what can happen with the Biden/Harris presidency. They have a plan, though some of us working in a couple of different areas find the plan woefully lacking.

Woefully lacking is an understatement. That is why we wrote the "Open Letter to Vice President Joe Biden," and we are pleased that Politico picked it up and that one member of congress has picked up on it. We hope for more. That is why there are several projects going on, a book soon to be released that talks about land loss, a documentary that tells the stories of mistreatment of Black farmers by the USDA, and another expose of larger matters after the election. 

That still is not the point of this post.

There was an emotional collision this morning as on the one hand I was preoccupied with the politics of the day around civil rights and Black farmers on the one hand and on the other hand I was trying to worship with Christian sisters and brothers in our region. The two collided as they often collide. 

The collision is something like, Waymon, why do you do these things. I have never known you to be a political sort of guy. Well, the truth of the matter is that I have typically had the philosophy that I don't have to be in charge, but if nobody is, I'll take the reins. So, from high school to college to graduate school to work on various campuses and now to the Black farmer movement, I have maintained a "political" stance. Politics, after all, is what happens when more than one person is in the same space. But now, I am not in charge of anything. I am trying to be a good ally and to create space where stories of Black farmers can be told with all of their truthfulness. 

While the Black farmer movement is a deeply political movement with its roots in racism that go back to the very start of this country all the way up through the antebellum south, the Civil War and the attempts to maintain slavery, into reconstruction, Jim Crow and the Black Codes, and all the way up until now. 

Politics must of necessity be involved as those in political power work to maintain the power that is in their hands, and they work to keep policies going that marginalize people of color and women and children. 

For me, these issues are political and they are personal and they are deeply spiritual. The God who created us has a better way for people to be treated. The God who fashioned all of these things we see in the universe, however that all happened, has a better way for us to relate to one another. 

So, when I see the tears of a Black man whose farm was stolen from him, when I see the angst in the face and voice of a Black woman who did not know if her husband was going to return from the farm at the end of the day, and when I see the tears and hear the sadness from three sons of a Black farmer and wife who died too early because of the relentless pressure of discrimination and the fight for justice, then, I take it all very personally. It is very personal and it is a spiritual battle. 

Such mistreatment of people is wrong. From the halls of congress to the Oval Office in the White House, to the campaign trail, to the rows of cotton and wheat and peanuts and soybeans, treating people in unjust ways because of the color of their skin is just plain wrong. 

In my files are copies of documents in which the USDA acknowledged wrongdoing, which coincidentally no one has ever gotten fired for doing, so this thing is real, and not just in the minds of a few misguided social justice advocates, including me. No, it is real, and when I read those documents, I see the blood, sweat, and tears of men and women who love their country and farming. 

So, I do what I do because it is the right thing to do. I follow the lead of brothers and sisters who have been in this fight for years, even decades because it is the right thing to do. 

On the Day of Judgment, I will stand before God and if I am asked why I spent my life doing what I did, I will simply say, because it was the right thing to do. Yes, Lord, it was THE RIGHT THING TO DO.