Policy Updates and Issue News January 2021

President Biden’s Team is Coming Together

Following his inauguration on the 20^th, President Biden’s cabinet team has been rapidly coming together. So far top-level picks such as Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, Secretary of the Treasury Janet Yellen, and Secretary of State Antony Blinken have been confirmed, with votes on Secretary of Transportation nominee Pete Buttigieg, Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandra Mayorkas, and Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo expected soon. As well, President Biden has moved faster than most previous administrations in appointing thousands of lower-level political positions throughout agencies in order to jumpstart his agenda.

President Biden Lays Out COVID-19 Relief Plan

With his cabinet coming together, President Biden has laid out his first legislative priority: a $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief bill. In the $1.9 trillion package are another round of stimulus checks at $1,400, billions of dollars in aid for schools, state and local governments, small businesses, unemployment benefits, and vaccine distribution. As well, the package includes larger overhauls including an increase to a $15 minimum wage, expanded paid leave for workers, increased tax credits for families with children, and an extension of an eviction moratorium. Despite efforts from the White House to gain Republican support for the bill, no Republican has indicated support for the current version and so, while the White House continues outreach, Democrats in the House and Senate are already pushing the bill through the complicated budget reconciliation process which will only require the support of Democrats to pass.

President Biden Signs a Flurry of Executive Orders

Like all other modern Presidential administrations, President Biden has spent his first week in office signing numerous executive orders. These orders generally target one of the four crises which his team has identified as the largest currently facing America, including COVID-19, the economic downturn, social justice, and climate change. As well President Biden has signed a number of miscellaneous orders targeting traditional Democratic priorities.

On COVID-19 Biden has signed orders to invoke the Defense Production Act to increase necessary vaccine supplies, purchase 200 million more vaccine doses, mandate masks on Federal property and interstate travel, require negative coronavirus tests to travel to the United States, create task forces focused on supply chains and equitable access, and canceled plans to leave the World Health Organization.

On the economic crisis, President Biden has signed an extended eviction moratorium, paused federal student loan payments, directed government agencies to have $15 minimum wage for all government contractors, signed a ‘buy American’ memorandum for Federal agencies, and created workplace COVID-19 protections.

On social justice, President Biden has signed orders to emphasize diversity in allocating Federal funds, end Department of Justice contracts with private prisons, condemn xenophobia against Asian Americans due to the origins of the coronavirus in China, end the ban on transgender service in the military, enforce sex discrimination rules in the case of LGBT+ individuals, place a moratorium on deportations for 100 days, end construction of the border wall, end the ban on individuals entering the US from certain Muslim-majority countries, and strengthen DACA protections.

On climate change, President Biden has signed orders to rejoin the Paris Climate Accords, cancel permits for the Keystone XL pipeline, place a moratorium on new oil and gas leases on Federal land, paused pending environmental orders from the Trump administration and placed many others under review to likely be rescinded, and created various climate policy councils and task forces to focus the administration’s efforts to combat climate change.

President Biden has also signed many other miscellaneous orders and will likely continue to issue executive orders at a rapid pace through the early weeks of his administration.

Pandemic Relief for Agriculture

On December 28, President Trump signed the Emergency Coronavirus Relief Act of 2020 which included $900 billion to combat the pandemic and $1.4 trillion in annual appropriations to run the federal government for FY21.   Agriculture and food assistance relief provisions include:

• Expanded hunger and food assistance
• Market loss payments to row crop producers, cattle producers, dairymen and contract growers
• Purchase of agricultural products for feeding programs
• Loans to food processors, distributors, farmers markets and others
• Support to offshore aquaculture
• Support to timber harvesting and hauling businesses
• Additional funding for local agricultural market programs, farmer training and outreach, specialty crop block grants, farmer stress programs and more.

In early January, Agriculture Secretary Perdue authorized an additional $1.5 billion food purchase to be distributed through the Farmers to Families Food Box program.  Then on January 23, President Biden signed an executive order increasing SNAP (food stamp) benefits and expanding them to the over 40 percent of recipients who are already at the maximum benefit.  Hunger among Americans is growing more serious.  According to a recent Census Bureau tracking survey, 14 percent of all adults reported their household didn’t have enough to eat the previous week.

Agencies Fight Over Animal Biotechnology

In mid-January, Secretary Perdue and Admiral Brett Giroir, M.D., head of the Public Health Service, signed a Memorandum of Understanding for the regulation of agricultural animal biotechnology innovation.  The MOU gives USDA animal biology regulatory oversight and FDA will ensure the safety of products derived from new technologies and animals developed using genetic engineering.  USDA already is the lead agency regulating plant biotechnology.  Since the signing however, FDA Commissioner Stephan Hahn has pushed back on the idea of sharing regulatory jurisdiction.

Who Owns the Biggest Farm?

We probably wouldn’t have guessed the fourth wealthiest person in the world, Bill Gates, is America’s largest private owner of farmland with 242,000 acres in 18 states across the country.  But Gates is not the largest total landowner.  That spot goes to Liberty Media Chair John Malone who owns 2.2 million acres of ranches and forests.   CNN founder Ted Turner owns 2 million acres of ranch land across eight states.  Even Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos is investing in land with 420,000 acres mainly in west Texas.

Rural Residents Hesitant on COVID Vaccination

A December Kaiser Family Foundation poll reported rural respondents gave three main reasons for refusing vaccination:

• They were not worried that they or a family member would become infected
• The seriousness of the pandemic is overblown
• Vaccination is more of a personal choice than a community responsibility

 The groups most likely to be vaccine-hesitant are Republicans, people ages 30-49 and rural residents in that order.  The groups most likely to get vaccinated are Democrats, households with serious health conditions and urban residents in that order.  The survey noted, however, vaccine hesitancy has been steadily dropping since September.  Another barrier to vaccination in rural areas is access.  One in three rural counties do not have a pharmacy connected to a national chain or network that has signed on to participate in the federal COVID Vaccine program.

Overall Vaccination Acceptance Up

Morning Consult is tracking the public’s attitudes on vaccination, social distancing, and comfort, plus political and institutional leadership.  The share of adults who now say they would get a COVID-19 vaccine hit 60 percent for the first time since July.  Interestingly, there is even a partisan divide on vaccination with 74 percent of Democrats and 49 percent of Republicans indicating they would get vaccinated.  Vaccine willingness is up 19 percentage points among Hispanic adults and 10 percent among Black adults.

Drug Overdose Deaths Rise

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports overdose deaths have accelerated during the pandemic with over 81,000 drug overdose deaths between May,2019 and May,2020.  Synthetic opioids like fentanyl have driven much of the increase.  The National Association of Counties has conducted research on the opioid epidemic that concentrated on the multistate area surrounding the Appalachian Mountains.  NAC found the best solutions came through local leadership spearheading a movement of educating community leaders on the effects of drug addiction and providing local resources to combat addiction (similar to the Grange work with RALI).

Early Detection Cancer Screening

According to the National Grange and a large number of health care advocates and patient groups, Medicare should cover new categories of multicancer screening for early detection of many forms of cancer.  Early detection of cancer saves lives, lowers treatment costs and increases the quality of life for patients and their families.  The groups cosigned a letter urging Congress to pass authorizing legislation to shorten FDA approval time for early detection tests.

The National Grange joined over 200 agriculture, food, rural, business, community and other groups on a letter to President Biden asking for his support for rebuilding the infrastructure of rural America.  These needs include roads, bridges, waterways, broadband, health care, water systems, housing and more.  The group suggested an approach that would pair federal resources with state, local and private sources of capital.

Broadband Funds in Relief Package

The $900 billion COVID relief package provides $7 billion in new broadband funding that includes these new priorities:

• Purchase of connectivity and devices for low-income individuals
• Additional connectivity for unserved areas and low-income communities
• Telehealth expansion
• Broadband mapping support (to determine the availability of access)
• Additional funding for state and local online learning technology and connectivity
• Support for the Distance Learning, Telemedicine and Broadband Program administered by USDA
• Support for small telecommunications companies to replace Huawei/ZTE equipment with secure equipment

More Telehealth

Health care visits by broadband households increased from 15% in 2019 to 41% in 2020.  Widespread adoption of virtual care is rapidly increasing the demand for ways to integrate connected devices with physician workflows to meet patient demand.

Closing Rural Telehealth Gaps

 The Health Resources and Services Administration has been awarded $8 million to fund the Telehealth Broadband Pilot project to access the broadband capacity available to rural health care providers and patient communities.  Also created was the Rural Broadband Initiative, a cross-cutting, multi-department move to coordinate programs working to expand and improve telehealth access.

Congress Asks for Accountability

A broad bipartisan coalition if 153 senators and representatives is asking the Federal Communications Commission to thoroughly vet the $9 billion in rural broadband funding awarded to internet providers last year through the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund.  The legislators are urging the commission to validate that each provider has the technical, financial, managerial, and operational skills to deliver the services they’ve pledged.  The RDOF is designed to close the digital divide that has existed since the beginning of the internet by investing in the construction of rural broadband networks.