Food Fight at USTR: Ag Interests Clash Over Exemptions on Big Farm-Sector Day of Forced-Labor Tariff Hearings
Industry witnesses press Trump trade officials to redraw the list of exempt food and drink imports — some want more products shielded from the 10% to 12.5% duties on 60 nations, while cattle groups demand Brazilian beef lose its protection
Agriculture and food industry representatives used the second day of hearings Wednesday to press the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) to rework the roster of food and drink products exempted from proposed Section 301 tariffs on 60 countries and economies accused of failing to bar imports made with forced labor. The testimony exposed a split within the farm and food sector itself: import-dependent food manufacturers and input suppliers want the exemption list expanded, while some domestic livestock producers want key items — notably Brazilian beef — struck from it.
The proposed action, announced June 2 and detailed in a June 5 Federal Register notice, would impose additional duties of 10% on 14 economies — including Canada, Mexico, the European Union, the United Kingdom, Guatemala and Taiwan — that maintain at least partial forced-labor import bans, and 12.5% on the remaining 46, a list that sweeps in China, Brazil, Japan, South Korea, India, Vietnam and most other major U.S. trading partners. Written comments closed July 6, and USTR is holding three days of public hearings July 7-9. Wednesday, the second day, was the farm and food sector’s turn at the microphone: the panel schedule stacked the day with meat, coffee and timber exporters; organic, seed, fresh fruit, floral and frozen food groups; wine, cheese and salt trade associations; and salmon, shrimp and smoked fish interests. Hearings conclude Thursday with cotton, apparel, footwear, textile, automotive and consumer goods panels.
At the center of Wednesday’s testimony is Annex A, the exemption schedule that carves out food and agricultural products “not available in sufficient quantities in the United States” — certain meats, tropical fruits and vegetables, coffee, tea, cocoa, spices and specialty crops — along with energy products, critical minerals, pharmaceuticals and civil aircraft. Seed companies and feed-ingredient suppliers asked USTR to add products they say U.S. agriculture cannot source domestically, warning that duties on essential inputs would raise costs for American farmers already squeezed by soft commodity prices. Corn and ethanol advocates, by contrast, generally backed the tariffs as leverage against unfair competition.
The sharpest pushback came from the cattle sector, which wants the exemption list narrowed, not broadened. R-CALF USA CEO Bill Bullard testified that exempting Brazilian beef would “substantively undermine” the administration’s own trade-enforcement objectives, given Brazil’s parallel Section 301 scrutiny over illegal deforestation. The National Cattlemen’s Beef Association asked USTR to remove all bovine products from the exemptions, arguing the carve-out “will not help lower beef prices” for consumers while denying U.S. ranchers protection. The U.S. Cattlemen’s Association went further, contending that illegal land clearing amounts to a de facto subsidy that lets Brazilian ranchers acquire pasture at artificially low cost. The stakes are real: Brazilian beef shipments to the U.S. totaled $1.66 billion in 2025 and reached $928 million in just the first four months of 2026 — even with record-high tariffs in place for part of that period.
Analysis: The annex is where the money is. The headline tariff rates matter less to food and agriculture than the fine print of the exemption schedule, and Wednesday’s testimony confirms industry knows it. USTR deliberately mirrored the exclusions developed during the IEEPA reciprocal-tariff era — shielding coffee, cocoa, bananas and other non-competing tropical products — precisely because food inflation remains a political liability for the administration. That gives food manufacturers a realistic shot at additions to the list. But it also means every exemption is contestable, and the cattle groups are testing whether “protect consumers from food inflation” or “protect domestic producers” wins when the two collide. Watch whether USTR treats beef — a product the U.S. does produce, in a cycle of historically tight supplies and record retail prices — differently from true non-substitutable imports like cocoa.
The legal backdrop raises the stakes. This Section 301 forced-labor action is the administration’s chosen replacement architecture after the Supreme Court struck down the IEEPA-based reciprocal tariffs in Learning Resources, Inc. v. Trump. Section 301 rests on explicit congressional delegation and decades of practice, making these duties far more durable in court — but the statute’s notice-and-comment machinery also gives industry the formal input the IEEPA tariffs never allowed. That is exactly what played out this week: the hearing process is not window dressing, and USTR has both the authority and, based on past 301 practice, the inclination to adjust product coverage between the proposed and final action.
Retaliation risk lands on farmers first. Brazilian representatives warned at the hearings of reciprocal measures if the duties take effect, and history says U.S. agriculture — soybeans, corn, pork, ethanol — absorbs the first counterpunch in any tariff exchange. With 60 economies covered, including nearly every significant buyer of U.S. farm exports, even modest tit-for-tat responses could compound across markets. Expect farm-state lawmakers to press USTR for both a generous input-exemption list and a credible plan for export retaliation, and expect a final determination later this summer that trims and tweaks Annex A rather than scraps it. With one more day of testimony still to come Thursday, the lobbying that surfaced publicly Wednesday will continue — in the hearing room and then in private — until the day that final notice publishes.
