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

 

 

Dear Senator Vance: You Got This One Very, Very Wrong

August 21, 2024

Senator J. D. Vance
288 Russell Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
 
Dear Senator Vance:
 
Words matter. Perspectives matter. Policies matter. I am confident that you know about the importance of these things. That leaves many of us in the Black Farmer Movement decidedly dismayed and even angry at your uninformed comments in the interview on Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan.
 
Your comments seem to come out of left field, were terrifically misguided, and are not grounded in reality. Here is your comment:
 
“The Harris Administration, for example, handed out farm benefits to people
based on skin color. I think that's disgraceful. I don't- I don't think we should say,
you get farm benefits if you're a Black farmer, you don't get farm benefits if
you're a white farmer. All farmers, we want to thrive, and that's certainly the
President Trump and JD Vance view of the situation. But I do think unfortunately,
when our leaders divide us by race, you're going to have hate on the left side
of the political spectrum. You're going to have hate on the right side of the political spectrum. We should just judge people based on individual characteristics and
based on merit, and that's certainly what President Trump and I want to do.”
 
Whether your misstep was intentional or not, it insulted a large group of African American farmers and their families. These families have fought to save their farms and to maintain their chosen way of life since the earliest days of Freedom, and for you as a leader in the Senate and now a candidate for Vice President adds insult to injury. If anyone should know about the pain and suffering it should be you as you represent a constituency that numbers 344 Black farmers according to the Nature Conservancy. This represents a drop from 2,000 in 1900. You, then, Senator Vance, have a vibrant and relatively large number of Black farmers whom you represent.
 
The ease with which you so smoothly spoke of these complicated matters leaves us furious and your devotees and listeners ill-informed. Your assertion that Black farmers got these dollars is partially right and partially inaccurate. Your assertion that farm benefits were “handed out to people based on skin color” is completely wrong. Either way, you managed to insult Black farmers and their families and friends.
 
As a professional who has been involved with Black farmers since 1994, and as a professional whose life has been lived in the academy, I am left with questions as to why you said what you said. I can think of four, and perhaps there are more.
 
One, are you simply uninformed? Two, are you opposed to leveling the playing field when discrimination is clearly evident, or do you believe in drawing distinctions based on skin color? Three, do you harbor ill will toward people of color, Black farmers in particular? Or, four, was it a convenient piece of data useable to take a jab at your opponents in the election, Kamala Harris and Tim Walz?
 
My first foray into the world of Black farmers came in the late ‘90s when I served as expert witness to four of the first fifteen Black farmers who prevailed against the DOJ and USDA. I got my first glimpse of the challenges of working with USDA and the county committee by listening to their stories of pain and suffering. As I continued in this arena, I published two peer-reviewed articles that were informative to me, and perhaps they can be to you and your staff. This article is co-authored in 2008 and this one that was published in 2018.
 
I would recommend that you do some further study into the history of Black farmers in particular and their challenges of dealing with the USDA and its racist orientation. Even if the Biden Administration was offering financial compensation for their years or even decades of discrimination, it would be totally appropriate. The shadows of discrimination and racism reach back into the past, and even USDA admits to it. Many authors chronicle the history of farming while Black in our country all the way back to the brutalities of the Middle Passage and into days of enslavement.
 
Another line of research is that of detailing the history of Black farmers in America versus white farmers. Against all odds, Black farmers became prolific land owners in the early decades of the 20^th century, and then in the third decade Black farmers began to lose their land. It is curious to me that two things overlap: the demise of Black farmers and the rise of government subsidies in the 1930s.
 
The data and historical narratives validate the fact that white farmers have always had the upper hand in programs and services when dealing with the USDA. Black farmers know that they’ll bring up the rear and have learned the hard way to distrust USDA and its employees, especially at the county committee level.
 
Pigford I and Pigford II did not level the playing field. Instead, those class action suits left farmers in far worse shape that before. Government reports indicate that only 371 of the thousands who prevailed under Pigford I actually received debt relief.
 
When the Justice for Black Farmers Act had been introduced in Congress in 2020, authors of the bill knew that it had no chance of passing. Then, the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 offered some degree of hope for Socially Disadvantaged Farmers and Ranchers (the 2501 designation) until white farmers driven by the absurd belief that they were victims of reverse discrimination filed 12 frivolous and racist law suits, the banking industry complained, Secretary Tom Vilsack slow walked the process, and that bill had an untimely death. Had it been passed, it would have offered 120% for eligible SDFR producers, 100% for their loans and 20% for taxes.
 
Congress then realized that nothing was going to pass unless it was “race neutral,” and so the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 was passed, and within it were sections dealing with “distressed borrowers” and those who had been victims of discrimination. The pool of potential candidates for these funds was opened widely such that any victim of discrimination regardless of race, color, creed, sexual orientation, etc., etc.
 
Back to your failure to adequately communicate meaningful numbers and perspectives, it is
true that 58,000 farmers applied, 43,000 prevailed, and according to an upper-level official at USDA, 80% of those prevailing were Black farmers, and they prevailed to the tune of $1.76B of the $2.2B. Without have precise calculations for farmers by group, as Secretary Vilsack refuses to release them, we are left to estimate the characteristics and numbers of those who prevailed. Either way this was sliced, white farmers were a part of the equation, so you cannot truthfully assert that these funds were only for Black farmers. The same goes for the $3.1B allocated by Congress in the IRA for “distressed borrowers,” and as most of those funds have been allocated, we do not know the distribution by race due to Secretary Vilsack’s lack of transparency in providing those numbers.
 
Given these footprints through the sands of time, Senator Vance, you are terribly wrong and
ill-informed about the role of Black farmers. Black farmers have indeed faced brutal discrimination and efforts to make amends for this are justified. However, you are also misguided in failing to assert that other groups were recipients of the DFAP funds under the IRA section 22007 who experienced discrimination and 22006, those farmers who were categorized as “distressed borrowers.”
 
A compelling piece of data is that between 1920 and 1997, Black farmers lost $326B in land. If we add to that figure production from the land, that total number of dollars in losses goes up exponentially. Most of this loss can be attributed to malfeasance within the USDA and the county committee. That is the game. Figure out how to get the land back and into white hands. As the USDA has been largely responsible for these losses, by implication, it is the USDA and the federal government who owe Black farmers the opportunity to start again.
 
It is also the case that Black farmers have faced the most violent of acts of discrimination since the days of enslavement, Freedom, Jim Crow, and to this very day. USDA has had a notoriously wicked reputation for ensuring that white farmers were given the majority of benefits and programs and that Black farmers were kicked to the curb. And that Black farmers faced a higher percentage of foreclosures than white farmers. Previously referenced reports verify these facts.
 
If indeed you would like to know how the USDA treats Black farmers, the film, “I’m Just a Layman in Pursuit of Justice: Black Farmers Fight the USDA,” produced by Shoun Hill and Waymon Hinson will reveal the brutal realities of their efforts to hold on to their land. These nine farmers in this film were nine of the fifteen Black farmers who filed suit against the USDA between 1997 and 1999, just before the certification of Pigford I v. Glickman.
 
So, Senator Vance, when you say it is a “disgrace” that the Harris administration handed out benefits to Black farmers, you are wrong and you are spitting in the faces of Black farmers who legitimately deserved recompense for the malfeasance perpetrated upon them by employees of USDA. You, sir, are also spitting on the graves of those who died in the battle for justice for people who looked like them. I could list them by name, some I only heard about and some I met during my time of working in this area.
 
You are saying things in a public forum that insult the lives and livelihoods of Black farmers and families who have tilled the soil and in doing so, helped to make this country the great country that it is.
 
I ask you, therefore, to study up on these issues, their history, and the legitimacy of these complaints, and that you make a public apology and speak more accurately as to what it means to farm while Black in America. It may be too late to make amends to our people in terms of votes being cast, but it could potentially go a long way toward redeeming you and your message regardless of what happens in November.
 
If a conversation with me would prove helpful, please feel free to contact me.
 
Respectfully,
 
 
Waymon R. Hinson, Ph.D.
Representative
USDA Coalition of Minority Employees
Justice for Black Farmers Group
www.letjusicering.blogspot.com
https://blackfarmersinsearchofjusticefilm.com/
Waymon.hinson@gmail.com
903-271-4654

They Did What? Unbelievable, Believable: An Advocate Shares the Story

They Did What? Unbelievable, Believable

Sometimes remarkable events just simply unfold in front of me. One of those happened last week when one of my former students, Dr. Lisa Merchant, now chair of the Marriage and Family Department at Abilene Christian Univerity, asked me to share the documentary and some thoughts about advocacy from a spiritual perspective. We did what Shoun and I separately or together often do, introduce the film, its background, its making, watch the film, and then discuss what the viewers saw and exprienced. Dr. Merchant and her co-teacher Dr. Tera Harmon did so beautifully. 

As most of you know, the film, "I'm Just a Layman in Pursuit of Justice: Black Farmers Fight Against USDA," chronicles the stories of 9 of 15 Black farmers who between 1997 and 1999 brought their cases of injustice to the US Department of Agriculture and the Department of Justice. While there are non-farmers in the film such as former Secretary of Ag, Mike Espy and the first lawyer for the farmers, James Myart, the film focuses on the stories of the farmers, their years of discrimination, and what they won and what they lost farming while Black in America. 

The students in their final class in the MFT program apparently listened intently as their questions were spot on and allowed me to rift off of them. One of the best was the notation that several times the farmers used phrases like "my DNA is in farming." A second comment was made by a student and the the emotions he felt when I read the names of the Black farmers who have died in the struggle for justice. There were others and it was a beautiful conversation. One huge blessing was that of having Dr. David Todd Harmon, COO of MANA and member of Social Justice Team II at ACU back in the day, reflect upon the film. He shared his skeptism of whether I was right or wrong, and how over the last twenty years he's learned the truth of it all. 

Additionally, I did have the opportunity to discuss the break in Shalom in the garden and how any harm to any person, any sin against another is a break in Shalom, and all of our efforts in the counseling room and in the arena of advocacy are attempts to recreate Shalom as best we can. What is Shalom you ask? It is more than peace, it is an active flourishing of the human experience, and much more than that. Racism is not the way it is supposed to be.Racism is not the way it is supposed to be. Discriminatory actions against those who simply want to farm is not the way it should have been. I also shared from Isaiah 61 and Luke 4 the narrative of Jesus entering the synagogue of his hometown of Nazareth, reading sections from Isaiah with the flourish of "you have heard this passage fulfilled in your hearing." Those words of Jesus capture His mission, to restore, to heal, to mend, to repair, to spread the good news of the Kingdom to "the least of these." 

It occurred to me in recent days that the documentary, sixty minutes in length, cannot possibly tell the entirety of the discriminatory actions done to them by employees of the USDA, so I created a list of both the farmers (anonymously) and deeds done against them. 

If you have not seen the film, I encourage you to at least watch the trailer and you'll get a good sampling of what the entire documentary is about. You'll feel with them in their pain and suffering, and you'll appreciate their willingness to share their stories and the gifts Shoun has in capturing them. 

Here is a fuller description of the acts of discrimination perpetrated upon them. This list is a reprint of a previous blogpost.This list is a reprint of a previous blogpost.

Farmer A and wife were set up by a retiring FSA County employee. Given their trust of him, they bought a farm at an overly high appraisal value. Their land’s productivity was likewise over estimated. Pest infestation was worse than they’d been told. They were denied operating loans by a hostile FSA office, favorable rulings by FSA were overturned. The “put a scar in me that will never heal,” said Farmer A’s wife.

Farmer B was denied operating loans and debt settlement options. The FSA illegally seized his disaster and crop payments. Early on, the FSA office lost his application for debt settlement, resulting in a drawn-out process in which he had to apply a second time. This person demanded that Mr. Farmer B sign blank settlement papers and perjured himself in depositions. The FSA unfairly liquidated his assets.

Farmer C and his wife were denied technical assistance and operating loans in a timely fashion. They were also provided inadequate farm operation loans. The local county office delayed information to him that was crucial to his farm operation, yet gave it to white farmers. They failed to provide him with loan applications and denied him loans despite the loans being collateralized. He was compelled to buy a larger combine than he needed, and then he lost both money and the combine. When farm operation loans came in, they were oftentimes late and less than half of what he needed to farm. The FSA officer demanded for four years that loans be filled out in pencil. His loan applications were altered. He received small loans well into planting season.  The local FSA office put his farm loans against old debts rather than toward the current farm operation. He was caught in the middle of collusion between banks and real estate agents. Loans were accelerated and foreclosure was started. The local office reneged on loans such that he could not pay for seeds or fertilizer.

For Farmer D, the needlessly prolonged process of loan applications meant that he missed out on prime opportunities for a chicken operation because the chicken company had moved on to a white farmer on a select rooster house by the time he got his money. When he did receive operating loans, he was micromanaged via a supervised account, something never done with white farmers. There was an absence of accountability for wrong doing at the county level. Land that he was leasing was sold out from under him and bought by a USDA county official who knew of its availability despite him having a lease/purchase agreement. His cows were shot and killed. He was nearly run off the road on one occasion as he was leaving the county office.

Farmer E was denied farm ownership loans during a time when white farmers were receiving them. The justification by the FSA was that he did not have farm experience despite having grown up on a farm. He was denied low interest operation loans and forced to pay higher interest rates. Similar young white farmers were not penalized. Lease agreements were sometimes terminated unjustly. The county FSA office failed to provide him with assistance. The FSA county agent was told to minimize support in order to insure failure. The FSA office reneged on lease agreements he had made in conjunction with them. His credit was ruined by FSA’s failure to support his efforts.

Farmer F was denied debt relief despite this being a legitimate option for him and his farm operation in years of natural disasters. The FSA withheld payments to him. They stopped payments on federal disaster relief following a severe drought that affected all area farmers. The FSA’s discrimination against him destroyed his credit and cost him $500,000. To this day, promised debt relief has never been provided.

Farmer G was denied loans based upon his status as a Black farmer. He was excluded from loan programs because he was Black. When he did receive loans from the FSA, he was charged exorbitant interest rates. The FSA delayed his receipt of loans which cost him financially. He was forced to work under a supervisory loan agreement unlike white farmers. On one occasion the local FSA office attempted to block his purchase of additional land. The seller worked cooperatively with him.

Farmer H was farming successfully. Despite owing the USDA a modest sum of money, it was only after he voiced support of his parents, Farmer I and his wife, that the USDA initiated foreclosure proceedings against him.

Farmer I and his wife were denied access to disaster relief funds despite disasters in the area for several years in a row. The FSA failed to offer to restructure loans in the face of natural disasters. They refused to allow his adult children to assume the loan, which was very modest at the time. The USDA compelled Farmer I to work under a supervised loan arrangement unlike area white farmers. The USDA settled and reneged on their agreements four times with them. They were told overt threats, “We’re going to sell you out.”  They were denied loans while at the same time the USDA failed to work with them to restructure their loans. The County Supervisor mishandled the USDA’s leaseback/buyback program and failed to follow their usual and customary loan servicing policies. The Department of Justice refused to settle despite the Office of Civil Rights decision that discrimination had occurred. Pigford I was on the horizon and DOJ wanted to wait. The USDA refused to offer debt write-down/write off in keeping with USDA policies. The USDA refused to provide homestead protection options. 

The history of USDA and DOJ is not a pretty read. And I'm glad now that MFT/ACU students and faculty can wrestle in some way with what I've wrestled with for years now. A driving question for me is "why, if democracy is important to all of us, and all people are created been equal, have we devolved in such a way that some people are worth far less than others? 

Status of Black Farmers Across the US and Texas

Recently a Black farmer was interviewed about the challenges of farming while Black in America. He replied with a touch of humor and sadness in his voice that we are losing so many Black farmers that we ought to put them on the endangered species list.

In the early decades following freedom, Black Americans became prolific land owners, the peak of which was reached in the early 1900s. Approximately 950,000 Black farm operators owned 22,000 farms, worked 47,000,000 acres, and owned 19,000,000 acres. While these numbers paled by comparison to white farmers, they were  staggering evidence that Black farmers violated a tenant stated by the wife of a Black farmer, “We were intended to work the land, but not to own the land.

Dispossession soon began to occur. The number of Black agrarians dropped precipitously over decades. While white ownership remained relatively stable, Black ownership dropped ultimately by 90%.

Currently, there are 35,470 Black-operated farms with 4.7 million acres, or 0.5% of the nation-wide farm land total. The precipitous drop from 47 million acres to 4.7 million is staggering as is the drop from 950,000 to 35,470 Black producers. It is estimated that the value of the losses of land and the value of production from the land between 1920 and 1997 were approximately $326 billion. What a loss in generational wealth.

But what about Texas? We have more Black producers than any other state. There are currently 11,268 Black producers who farm 972,552 acres. This amounts to 3% of the state’s total farm producers. Smith and Freestone Counties each have over 300 Black-operated farms. While statistics are lacking, essentially Black farmers do not trust USDA, so they avoid funding opportunities and services by USDA as they farm smaller parcels or focus on smaller cow/calf operations. In recent years, however, at least one Black farmer successfully prevailed against the USDA and its discriminatory practices, and another family had its debts canceled by USDA’s agency, the Family Service Agency, under current USDA/FSA policies. What has impacted Black farming across the country has certainly impacted Black farmers in Texas.

USDA has readily admitted that their programs and personnel discriminate against Black farmers, especially at the county committee level, but the Department refuses to address it. The list is long and painful. The USDA refuses to supervise the county committee and thus, Black farmers do not get the support they need for loan applications, technical support, disaster relief, and loan restructuring and much, much more. The result is foreclosure and loss of land and livelihood. On one occasion the check written by the USDA was held in a file folder until the land was foreclosed upon and the farming operation was gone. The land was bought by an adjacent white farmer. This only scratches the surface of the acts of discrimination that occur. In 2022 the USDA approved white farmers loans at a rate of 72%, but Black farmers at a 36% rate. Black farmers received only .01% of covid relief funds despite making up 5% of all farmers.  

Certainly, farming is a hard business, but it should not be more difficult because of the color of one’s skin. The pain and suffering experienced by Black farmers are indescribable. Fighting against the system which refuses to change, and facing one microaggression after another has resulted in emotional, relational, and physical damages to persons and family members. Farmers often weep when recounting the damages in their bodies causes by persistent racism within USDA.

The USDA and Congress have made attempts to change but all to no avail. Fifteen Black farmers prevailed against the USDA between 1997 and 1999. Pigford I and Pigford II which stretched from the late ‘90s well into the early 2000s were failed efforts. Reports such as the Jackson Lewis Report, the D. J. Miller Report, the Civil Rights Action Team Report, and the Civil Rights Implementation Team Report, and of late the Equity Commission Report, and others, but racism continues unabated. There must be a will to make changes that harm people and destroy livelihoods.

Congressional actions including the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 and the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022, both promised much, but delivered little to Black farmers.

Yes, distrust has been well earned and well documented. There must be hope, and the bill recently proposed, “Just USDA Standards and Transparency Act of 2023” along with the Justice for Black Farmers Act of 2023, offer much to Black farmers in efforts to root out racism and to promote transparency and accountability.

What are advocates doing? They are appealing to the White House for changes within the leadership of the USDA, appealing directly to the Secretary of the USDA for more transparency and accountability, challenging the county committee system, and challenging the manner in which funds for discrimination are allocated under the IRA of 2022. They lobby various congressionals including Elizabeth Warren, Corey Booker, and Raphael Warnock. They held a one-day march in front of the White House back on March 1. This is a righteous cause for this group of people.

Trust must be restored nation-wide and here in Texas. Farmers are vital to our economy and our way of living. Black farmers are equally important to our way of life and must be treated fairly and equitably.

Reverend Senator Raphael Warnock: Step, Stand, and Stay with Us, An Open Letter

February 25, 2024

The Honorable Raphael Warnock, Ph.D.
407 Auburn Avenue
Atlanta, GA 30312
 
416 Russell Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
 
Dear Senator Warnock:
 
It is a pleasure to worship with Ebenezer each Sunday morning and especially today with the preaching of Olu Brown. Besides growing up in the same region of East Texas, he and I share in common a concern for the gospel and for people.
 
My “transition” to Ebenezer took place several months back when two things happened: 1) my physicians told me to stay out of crowds lest I contract a disease and die and 2) my growing discontent with a white church with a smattering of Black sisters and brothers and a growing shift to the right and a lack of interest in engaging important matters in our larger community.
 
Besides our mutual degrees in theology, you and I share a deep concern for all to be included at the table and all to be included in farming across this great land of ours. I understand that you have been instructed by the writings of James Cone and Howard Thurman. I have only come to embrace their writings and ways of thinking and living in my senior years. As you share inside information as a member of the Senate Agriculture Committee, I share a deep concern for the mistreatment of Black farmers at the hands of USDA. Since 1995 I have listened to injustices perpetrated upon Black farmers, I have heard and heard again of the pain and suffering that farmers and their families experience at the malfeasance of USDA/FSA that lands squarely in their laps. As a board member of BFAA, Tillery, NC, and as a representative of the Justice for Black Farmers Group and as a co-laborer with Lawrence Lucas, President Emeritus, USDA Coalition of Minority Employees, I have had the pleasure and the pain of advocating on behalf of Black farmers and families at a whole different level, one upon which you live, move, and breathe. My speeches, publications, blogposts, and even a documentary are easy enough to find.
 
In Reverend Brown’s sermon this morning, as he touched on the three actions of faith as exemplified by the Israelites there at the Jordan: Step, Stand, and Stay, I was convicted that such actions can easily apply to the Black Farmer Movement by the farmers themselves, by advocates like me, and by congressionals with power like you.
 
Those three actions exemplify the Black farmers and advocates. We stepped out in faith that their cause was a worthy cause, convinced that Black farmers had been kicked to the curb since the earliest days of USDA, and likewise convinced that the investigative reporting verified the horror stories that we had heard for decades. We have moved into standing. We would not be moved by a different administration. We were unmoved by the rhetoric of promises following by a display of inaction. We are unmoved by the cherry-picking of USDA and its debt relief while Black farmers lose their land. And we have stayed. We stay as our people die. One of my studies has been the impact of the micro and macro-aggressions of the county office on the health and well being of farmers and families. You have heard of the death of some: Eddie and Dorothy Wise and Eddie Slaughter, just to name three. While we have life and breath, we will stay in the struggle. While we have life and breath, we will stay until racism has been removed from USDA and until all of God’s children are treated with the same dignity, respect, and funding for farming.
 
We wrote you a letter on March 4, 2021. That letter is attached to this letter for your convenience. The tragedy is that much has stayed the same. Things have not changed for the better the last three years for Black farmers. In fact, we think things are actually worse and land loss and its tragedies happen right before our very eyes.
 
We are asking that you step, stand, and stay with us. We respectfully ask that you meet with us and discuss the current status of Black farmers and that you work with us to find avenues of remediation. Avenues and actions are there: the Justice for Black Farmers Act should be enacted, greater transparency and accountability should be mandated for the USDA, Black farmers should receive the same benefits as any farmer in terms of funding for farming and farm operating loans and other matters, loss of land and livelihood must cease, and the White House and USDA must declare and show with actions that Black farmers from New York, down through the South, across to Texas and then the Midwest, and across the Southwest, and even to California and the western states all matter, Black the same as white in all matters related to farming.
 
Thank you for reading this letter. We eagerly await your response and an opportunity to meet with you.
 
Respectfully,
 
----S----
 
Waymon R. Hinson, Ph.D.
www.letjusticering.blogspot.com
www.blackfarmersinsearchofjusticefilm.com
Psychologist/Marriage and Family Therapist
Advocate/Researcher
Representative for BFAA, Justice for Black Farmers Group, and
  USDA Coalition of Minority Employees
903-271-4654
Waymon.hinson@gmail.com
 
CC: Lawrence Lucas
       Corey Lea
       Michael Stovall

Stories of Baseball, Black Farmers, and the Young

I am a fan of stories. I love stories. It's been said that we live in and through our stories and that they give us meaning. We will not remember the three key points of a recent speech or sermon, but we will remember the stories told to flesh out the points. 

A long time ago when my oldest grandson was eight years of age, three generations of family sat in a favorite restaurant talking about things of interest, and then the little boy who was sitting across the table reading his book asked me a question, "Why do you work with Black farmers?" Didn't know he was listening. How do you answer a complicated question like that in words a child can answer. Was he really asking about his Poppie, or was he asking about them? I took the them route and simply told him, "because they have been mistreated." He seemed satisfied with the answer. In the years since then we have deconstructed in painful ways how Black farmers in fact have been mistreated. Here is more of that story written in 2007, if you'd care to read it.  

Several months later, the setting and topics changed but the questions remained. We were at this little guy's house and he was curious about Negro League baseball. How he landed on the topic is beyond me at this point. It might have been a wonderful book we were looking through by Kadir Nelson, "We Are the Ship," the history of Negro League baseball. The grandson wanted to know about Satchel Paige, Josh Gibson, and others. For a young child, he wanted to know why Black baseball players could not play in the major leagues against white ball players back then. So, we had a simple conversation about race and justice and inequality. To memorialize the conversation, or so my memory reminds me, he actually drew for me a picture of Paige standing on the mound. That book by Nelson and that work of art by my grandson are prized treasures in my collection. Here is the rest of that story. You can even see the cover of Nelson's book and the drawing of Satchel Paige. 

And then just last week another question came from an eight year old grandson. It shocked me. For some reason, I was showing him some photos of the March 1 protest event in front of the White House. He was impressed that his Mema was carrying a sign. I showed him a picture of Reverend Binion and told him a little of his story. I pointed out Lawrence Lucas and shared a few details about him and my relationship with him. I pointed to Willie Head and told about meeting him a lot of years ago and talking with him. I pointed in several pictures to the White House in the background. 

You may remember a story about this little guy from a few years back. You can read the letter that I wrote to him back in 2019. You can even see his little hand holding up the sign, "Black Lives Matter." If you saw the complete picture, you would see him chanting that phrase with intensity on his face. 

I wrote to him these words: "You have been a part of something huge. You are only five years of age, and you likely do not get it now. You do what five year-old kids do, you read, run, pretend, build forts, play with your sisters, eat Poppie Snacks with me, sit next to your Mema and watch Paw Patrol, and make pretend things out of your food."

But on this particular day, some four or five years after marching in that protest march, he asked me a heavy question while we looked through the photos on the web: "Poppie are you and Mema important?" I was stunned by his question, so I stammered a couple of minutes about knowing people and them knowing us and all, and simple left it there. Then, a few minutes later, I talked to Charla, his Mema. Her reply to me was simply put: "we're not important but the Cause is." Wish I had had those words at the moment. 

The next morning, over breakfast, I reminded him of his question. He remembered asking it. It was then that I said, "Mema and Poppie are not important, but the Cause is important." I had his attention so I attempted to say in words and phrases he could understand that Black farmers and white farmers are not treated the same. White farmers get all the money they need to farm, but Black farmers don't. When Black farmers cannot pay back their loans, men come and take away their tractors and sometimes even sell their houses and their land. I think in his young, innocent way he got it. 

I have a feeling that this young man and I will talk again. 

Sometimes the young grasp things more quickly than us older folks. 

Until we have the next conversation, my grandson will continue to read things, watch videos with his Poppie, play with his sisters, skate out front in the street with his dad and sisters, and other kid things.

I can be patient. I can wait for the next conversation. He is already good at asking perceptive questions. 

O Come, O Come, Emmanuel

There is something very different about this season of the year. My wife and I have chosen to celebrate Advent, the coming of the Christ child in our home by reading scripture, praying, and pouring over  meditations that friends or acquaintances from Abilene Christian University have written. Our church tradition has NEVER celebrated Advent, with the exception of the church we attended in Abilene back in the day. And, I find that very odd. 

Something is different this year. I feel a stirring within me. 

I ponder the differences between this year and last year or the year before or the year before that. I suspect that there are several things that make for a difference this year. For the first time, obinutuzumab is coursing through my veins. I get it every week or two weeks, sitting in an infusion room for four or five hours as the drip, drip, drip, drip makes its way down the bag, via the tube, into my IV, and into my body. It leaves me very exhausted. One nurse said that it is cumulative. I believe her. It has a mind of its own. Some days the effects are minimal and others I barely drag around. 

Then, in about two or three weeks from now, I'll begin taking a pill form of immunotherapy, a pill called ventaxlata, and I hear it will be rougher than the IV drug. We'll see. 

My wife and I are cautious as to where we go and when we go and whether we wear masks or not. I've learned that the only two people who are concerned about my body and its low level of immunity are she and I. I do not go to large gatherings, especially gatherings where I suspect that the setting is a petri dish for COVID or RSV or the flu.

Why do I say all of this? Is it an introduction to a larger story? 

The short verse is that I was stirred by a podcast from Ecclesia Houston, a message delivered by Sean Palmer, a teaching pastor there, a minister who was at ACU as a student back in the day when Charla and I were there. We know some of the same people and know some of the same stories. 

His message which is linked below, is about magi coming to worship the Christ child. Against all odds, they found the child, bowed down and worshipped and left the child with gold, frankencense, and myrrh, not exactly gifts you'd think to leave a child, or to his father or mother. How about sanitary wipes, diapers, formula, baby clothes, or even a toy that rattles. 

They knew to head in the opposite direction from Herod who may have come across as a benevolent King, but they knew better.

Frankly, that is where I am this year. In my weakened state, I can only give what I can give to the Christ child. I can only do what I can do. No more no less. One of the gifts I oftentimes bring is the gift of words in prose or poetry form, but this year, more often than not, those words do not coming. 

The cancer in my blood, small cell lymphacytic lymphoma, and the medications to treat it, have consumed more often than not my words, emotions, dreams, and wishes. 

During this season, I want to offer to the newborn King words of hope on behalf of a marginalized people. If you follow the words on this page, you know who they are. They are Black farmers, women and men whose DNA is in the soil, whose blood is in the soil, who want nothing more than to work the land and to pass the land on to their children and grandchildren. Yet, in the way of their aspirations stands the monolythic agency with its myriad of sub-agencies, the United States Department of Agriculture. It is rife with all forms of malfeasance and corruption. Those who want to do good are often kicked to the curb by those who value sameness over change. Search out the names Stucki and Rosenberg and you'll read what I'm talking about and have heard since 1994. 

I'd like to offer them more during this Advent season. On some days, maybe the words and ideas and directions will come. On other days, words, ideas, and directions will not come. 

So, all that I have to offer the Christ child in this Advent season is some measley leftovers. Leftovers from fatigue, IV drip, insomnia, and SLL. 

Come, o come Emmanuel. Come into our world. Redeem our world. Save us from ourselves. 

Here is Pastor Sean Palmer's message for Advent, week one. 

https://ecclesiahouston.org/liturgy/2023/11/27/searching-for-jesus-advent-week-one.

You Must Choose a Side: Justice Demands It

You and I both know the tossed around phrase, "There's good people on both sides." We know from whence that phrase came. There's another phrase perhaps you've heard before, "Justice takes sides." Or maybe "justice is what love looks like out in the open," or something to that effect. Cornel West is fond of that last statement. 

I am also a fan of Dr. Jemar Tisby and his books, podcasts, and his words from substack. Here is one that struck me a day or so ago, so I've been turning it over and thinking of its applications. Do you do that at times yourself? This particular article has its background in the Montgomery Boycott in 1955, prompted by Rosa Parks and her determination to keep her seat, which led to a 381 day boycott of the bus system in Montgomery as Black Americans found alternate ways to work, shop, and to other events whereas prior they would get on the segregated bus and move to the back. 

One of the key decisions by the city's fathers and mothers was to find a new voice for the movement, and they found that voice in Martin Luther King, Jr., the new pastor at the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church. Other sisters had voiced protest against the segregated bus system, but it didn't stick like it did in 1955. 

Dr. King tells his version of those momentous days in his book, "Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story." It is a riveting book. It's time for me to read it again and wonder out loud to myself why I underlined or starred or commented on certain paragraphs or sentences. 

In Dr. Tisby's substack article referenced above, there was a particular sentence that stuck with me. Without taking the world's opinion as to its orgin, I hunted through the entire book, and there it was, bracketed and underlined on page 51. Here is the quote: "He who passively accepts evil is as much involved in it as he who helps to perpetuate it. He who accepts evil without protesting against it is cooperating with it." There is much more to that paragraph, but it'll wait for another day. 

So, while Dr. Tisby offers a well-articulated broad brush stroke for this riveting phrase, my mind, heart, and words go to a specific context: Black farmers, their oppressors, those doing the oppressing and those who idly stand by with a toothpick in their mouths, feigning ignorance or "not my problem." 

What the USDA/FSA  have done to Black farmers is indeed evil. "What evils do you recall?" Dr. Hinson, you might ask. Thanks for asking. I'll name a few. 

Selling land to a Black farmer, knowing that the land is over-priced and cannot produce the volume of cotton to make the payments on it, so your good friend can come along and buy it for a below market value price, that's #1.  Do you think others in that FSA office knew about these shenanigans? 

Foreclosing on a farmer because he got his loan too far into the planting season, that's # 1, and then when a disaster came, that is, too much rain, so that he could not get into the fields to harvest his crop, you don't offer him disaster relief, that's # 2, and then to settle his debt, you seize equipment that belongs to his parents, # 3. Or, when the farmer fills out paper work for the operating loan, you tell him to write it in pencil and you'll make it cash flow, and then in a depostion you lie about it, that's # 4, but your secretary says, "No. That's what he did." Do you think others in that FSA office knew about these shenanigans besides the secretary? At least she had courage to tell the truth. 

Farmers depend on operating loans long before the planting season draws near, but you, Mr. FSA guy, deny him loans, sending him again and again and again, demanding that he fill out his paper work differently, that's # 1. You deny them for so long, that his pigs actually die, # 2. Then, he appeals the decision up to the state level, and that office sides with Mr. Black farmer, but you take his check, place it in his file, and never tell him about it until it's too late, and his pigs were dead, # 3. Then, you force him and his ill wife out, sell the land at an open auction, and his neighbor, the white guy over there buys it for below market value, # 4. His wife dies and then he dies in an untimely manner. Do you think in a small office in rural America, that other people were standing idly by and watching it all unfurl? I think so. There are more than just four evil actions in this situation. There are too many to count, but they all have a common denominator. 

Those items listed above? Let's call them what they are. Acts of evil. Oppression is evil. Watching as it unfolds is evil. Call them what they are. EVIL. There are no innocent bystanders in this thing called racism. If you know, your guilty, as guilty as if you did the evil thing yourself. 

As an aside, I know of one farmer family in which an office person knew that such malfeasance was going on, so he pulled the farmer and wife in, laid out the materials and told them all that was going on, and they eventually won their case against USDA/FSA and the local bank. That employee was courageous, very courageous. 

There are more stories, but I think you can see the points I'm making. Some people intentionally make decisions that harm people. People in positions of power and influence decide that farmers who skin is Black should not have that much land, do not need to farm that much land, do not need to have that much money from their harvests, and do not need to have those expensive pieces of equipment. Those people are evil according to the quote from Dr. King. Other people who sit around and watch it happen, other office employees, other agents of the federal government, other powerful people in powerful positions are just as evil as they turn a blind eye, accepting evil behavior without protesting. They are just as complicit as it the person who signed the documents that led to the farmer's foreclosure on his property and way of life. 

Racism is evil. Turning a blind eye and saying nothing about racist behaviors is racism also. 

There's a lot of evil-doing these days as the plight of Black farmers is being ignored: Mr. President, Mr. USDA Ag Secretary, Mr. and Mrs. Senators, Mr. and Mrs. Congressionals. Mr. and Mrs. employees of the USDA, you who have your fingers on explosive information, but the Secretary says not to release it via the FOIA process because, "It'll make us look bad." 

Yes, there is a lot of evil going on over in the agriculture world these days. There is a lot of complicity going on. The people I know and respect will not look away. They and I are truthtellers. We are whistle blowers. We demand accountability and transparency. 

I hope you do, too. Call your senators and congressional folks and tell them what is going on. Feel free to use anything captured in any of the posts on this blog. 

The wheels of justice grind slowly and along the way, those wheels and those sitting in powerful postions all the way from the local level to the highest offices in our land, they are responsible for the grind that destroys our people. Two of our people have met their ancestors the last few weeks. We grieve and we mourn, but we do not give up.