1. United States
2. N.C.
3. Letter

I appreciate the reply, but it does not engage with what farmers on the ground are actually saying in Trump’s second term. You write about “level playing fields” and “fair trade deals,” yet Trump’s renewed tariff fights have depressed export markets, pushed up input costs, and left many small and mid‑sized operations feeling like they are being squeezed harder than ever. Farmers are not using abstract language about “challenges”; they are saying things like “he’s killing us with these tariffs” and “first time around he wrote us checks; this time we just get the bills.” They see foreign buyers pivoting to Brazil and elsewhere while aid is thinner and slower than in his first term, and a lot of them are asking, very bluntly, how they are supposed to survive this. You also don’t address labor at all. Producers who rely on immigrant and seasonal workers are telling anyone who will listen that stepped‑up enforcement and a climate of fear are making it impossible to find and keep the workforce needed to plant, tend, and harvest. They are leaving crops in the field, cutting acreage, or getting out of higher‑value specialty crops because the labor simply isn’t there. That is not an abstract policy question; it is an existential threat to their businesses this season and next. Against that backdrop, highlighting an Agritourism Advisor at USDA feels wildly mismatched to the scale of what rural producers are facing. Agritourism has its place, but it will not fix broken export markets, a gutted labor pipeline, higher machinery and fertilizer costs, or cuts and freezes in core USDA and rural‑development programs. The farmers you say you understand are not asking for more promotional advisors in Washington; they are asking for: - Trade policy that stops using them as collateral damage. - A workable, predictable farm labor system instead of constant disruption. - Protection of core safety‑net programs and rural health and infrastructure, rather than cuts dressed up as “reform.” If agriculture is truly the backbone of North Carolina’s economy, then the priority has to be shielding that backbone from the specific second‑term policies that are weakening it right now, not just adding another advisory title in an office in D.C. I would ask you, concretely: where do you stand on Trump’s current tariff strategy, immigration enforcement approach, and proposed changes to crop insurance and farm support programs—and how, exactly, will you oppose what is hurting your own farm communities, not just applaud their resilience in form letters?