President-elect Joe Biden’s decision to bring Tom Vilsack back to lead the Agriculture Department has enraged many farmers of color who say his record on civil rights should have disqualified him from the job.
The criticism comes as Biden is under intense pressure to name a historically diverse Cabinet and expectations had been particularly high for USDA, which has been almost exclusively led by white men and systematically discriminated against farmers of color and women, giving them far less access to crucial federal programs since its inception in 1862. “Vilsack is not good for the agriculture industry, period,” said Michael Stovall, founder of Independent Black Farmers, a coalition of Black growers and producers from key Southern states working to raise awareness on issues faced by Black farmers. “When it comes to civil rights, the rights of people, he's not for that. It's very disappointing they even want to consider him coming back after what he has done to limited resource farmers and what he continues to do to destroy lives." While the criticism of Vilsack on racial equity is well-organized and the disappointment runs deep on the left, the opposition is not expected to threaten his path to confirmation. The former two-time Iowa governor who served as Agriculture secretary for all eight years of the Obama administration sailed through the confirmation process in 2009 with unanimous approval in the Senate. John Boyd, president of the National Black Farmers Association, said he was disappointed to learn about both the meeting with civil rights leaders and the Vilsack nomination from news reports after he had spent months working with Biden’s campaign and his transition team...
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