Freedom Rally: Producers, others voice concern over USDA animal disease traceability rule at Rapid City Rally, October 7
Congress has never approved a law mandating the use of radio frequency identification (rfid) tags in the U.S. cattle herd.
Congresswoman Hageman
Wyoming Congresswoman Harriet Hageman reminded around 400 people who attended the Ranchers-Cattlemen United Stockgrowers of America (R-CALF) and U.S. Cattlemen’s Association jointly-hosted Freedom Rally in Rapid City, South Dakota, Oct. 7, 2024, that “USDA is only entitled to carry out law as Congress has written. Congress has never ordered livestock producers to use RFID,” she said. The event was held in conjunction with the South Dakota Stockgrowers Association convention, and South Dakota Stockgrowers Association Executive Director Doris Lauing served as the moderator.
“But USDA and some big packers and eartag manufacturing companies have attempted to push this through now for a decade,” she said.
Cattle producers and others gathered from at least eight states to make known their opposition to USDA’s mandatory rfid rule set to be implemented Nov. 5, 2024.
The rule requires that sexually intact cattle over 18 months of age that move across state lines as well as bear an official USDA rfid tag.
Hageman said that while USDA estimates the current rule affects about 11 percent of the nation’s cattle, she expects this is just one step in a larger plan.
“This is a classic example of what government does. It’s incrementalism. They start small so everyone thinks it’s ‘no big deal’ and then they move on to the next group and then the next group,” she said.
Hageman doesn’t trust USDA’s math. In 2013 the agency estimated a full blown mandated program for the entire industry would cost between $1.2 to $1.9 billion. Eleven years later, they estimate that in order to electronically identify 11 percent of the nation’s herd costs just $26.1 million. “Do you think the cost has gone up or down?” she asked the crowd.
Corbitt Wall
Corbitt Wall, a DV Auctions market analyst and reporter also addressed the crowd.
“I could see the train wreck this was,” said Wall, who agrees with Hageman that this USDA plan is a “foot in the door” for a bigger, more expansive plan.
“We know every time APHIS comes up with a program, they get more employees, they get more power and you get more regulations,” she said.
“It’s going to be all classes of cattle, from birth to slaughter. They started with dairy cattle and nobody raised a fit, that industry is already compensated by the government,” said Wall.
“So now they say, let’s cram it down your throat.”
Wall said it’s going to be “impossible” to force producers to apply rfid tags to all cattle nationwide. “They don’t understand what it takes to do that. You people understand, the salebarns understand,” said Wall.
“If you don’t think they’ll use the tracking of these cattle to track carbon credits, you’re wrong. They absolutely will,” said Wall.
Hageman explained that in Ireland and the Netherlands, after mandatory electronic identification programs were implemented, their governments implemented extreme climate-related measures. In the Netherlands, producers were required to pay a $100 per head carbon tax and in Ireland, the industry was forced to euthanize 41,000 head of cattle to “reduce global warming.”
Hageman said if the US continues down the same road the European countries have, that American producers will soon need to hire a “compliance expert” to help them fill out paperwork and keep track of rules.
Chip Neiman, a Wyoming rancher and legislator followed up with similar thoughts. “Our federal government wants to control and regulate,” he said.
Make your politicians and representatives accountable, they work for you. Many times, they’ve lost that focus. They aren’t there to be served, their responsibility is to serve us,” he said.
USCA
USCA’s President Justin Tupper, who manages the St. Onge, South Dakota, salebarn, said the practical side of the rule will be very difficult for auction barns, especially if the rule grows to include more cattle.
“It’s going to be a huge problem for us at any point in time as they continue to push it to cattle that are not breeding cattle moving across state lines,” he said.
Tupper said he does not believe USDA has any proof that the rfid tag is more efficient than the current system.
“I can already tell you, it won’t be (more efficient),” he said. “There is no infrastructure in place to gather that data.”
The data, and the entity that controls it is the biggest issue, said Tupper.
He also pointed out that the cattle industry needs to remind USDA that our information is “confidential” just like USDA tells the cattle industry when it comes to packer information.
R-CALF USA
Bill Bullard, R-CALF USA’s CEO, said the USDA animal id rule is ineffective and ineffectual at accomplishing their objective. “This rule won’t accomplish what the government is trying to achieve. It doesn’t require you or anyone to own a wand or have a software system. All it requires is for you to expend the cost to put a tag in their ear,” he said.
Bullard talked about the US joining the World Trade Organization in 1995, putting this country under the World Health Organization. “Then they decided to begin pressuring nations to implement government regimes for animal traceability. They proposed NAIS – identification from birth to death. We fought back. They wrote proposal after proposal and voluminous documents on how they would force us to comply. We already have a traceability program that is second to none. We need to have the flexibility to continue doing what we need to do,” Bullard said.
Hageman’s House Joint Resolution 167 would stop the implementation of the rfid mandate. She and the other rally speakers urged all cattle producers to call their congressmen and senators and ask for support of that bill.
State Laws
Wyoming legislator Chip Neiman and South Dakota legislator Marty Overweg, who both spoke at the rally, carried bills for their respective states to protect their states from the implementation of any mandatory animal identification program.
In South Dakota, HB 1096 gives South Dakota producers the express right to choose their form of identification, as the USDA 2013 rule allowed.
The Wyoming law is similar:
“For the purposes of animal disease traceability, Wyoming livestock owners may choose to identify animals using any methods set forth in 9 C.F.R. part 86, as adopted on January 9, 2013, as well as any additional methods that are later approved by the Wyoming livestock board as “official identification”. Nothing in this section shall be construed to limit or amend the brucellosis surveillance or testing program administered by the state.”
Overweg points out that producers in South Dakota and Wyoming who move cattle out of state, however, would likely still be required to apply the rfid tags as called for in USDA’s plan.
When asked if the federal law will supersede the state laws, Hageman, an attorney, said “they could argue this regulation pre-empts state law.”
“The question becomes whether USDA will sue you (your state),” said Hageman. But she pointed out that because the current law requires mostly cattle moving out of state to be tagged, the enforcement will take place in the state that the cattle are moving to – probably a salebarn or feedyard in another state.
Producers encouraged to have a voice
“I am very confident that there will be lawsuits filed against this,” said Hageman. What I come back to is, what right does USDA have to impose a $2 billion tax on your industry that you are adamantly opposed to, and that they can’t demonstrate that there is a need for it.”
“We have the safest, highest quality cattle and meat in the world,” she said. What they are saying is, ‘we’re going to have hoof and mouth’ and my response is, ‘then what are you doing about that? Why are you talking about importing disease and then coming up with a solution that destroys our industry?'” she said.
“I’m an attorney, I love suing the federal government, but that’s not the way the government is set up. This is a government of, by and for the people. We are not serfs. We control them, they don’t control us. And I mean that at every single level. That’s why we have to be pushing back against these things. Because at some point we have to get this ship right and at some point we’re going to have to get this government back to what our government is supposed to be doing for us not ‘what we’re supposed to be doing for them,'” she said.
“You cannot have the government controlling every aspect of your lives,” she said.
