At a town hall on Tuesday, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) was asked about how tariffs will impact farmers in Iowa.
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00:00So has anybody come to talk about the farm bill?
00:04Okay, nobody wants...
00:06I have a farm question.
00:07Go ahead.
00:08Okay, my son has cattle.
00:10Yes.
00:10And he works a regular job and then he has cow-calf pairs.
00:16Sure.
00:16And so I just wonder how the tariffs will affect someone like him.
00:22So if market-wise and long-term.
00:25From this standpoint, it could affect...
00:28It's too early to make a judgment if what I'm going to say will happen.
00:33But for instance, one benefit might be from the fact that Australia today doesn't take our beef.
00:46So if Australia is one of those hundred countries that have come to Washington now to negotiate
00:51because Trump put the tariffs on and we can get our beef into Australia,
00:56that would be to his benefit.
00:59But it could also be negative from the standpoint that if people don't negotiate,
01:06because there's a lot more countries than the hundred that so far come to the table,
01:12then we know from past years, not just under Trump but under other presidents,
01:22that when you put something negative like a tariff on some country,
01:27they seem to retaliate against agriculture issues.
01:34Now, I think it's probably more grain than it is livestock, as an example.
01:44Okay, then, Prescript, go ahead.
01:46Well, I have an aligned question from a colleague in Fairfield.
01:50It says, Senator Grassley, thank you for co-sponsoring the Trade Review Act 2025,
01:54which would restore congressional oversights of President Trump's tariffs.
02:02Given the uncertain fate of that bill in the House,
02:05what additional measures are you taking to protect your constituents and other Americans
02:11from the risks of inflation and recession likely to result from President Trump's tariffs
02:16and from his lack of consistency, which undermines agriculture and business planning?
02:23Excellent.
02:24Okay.
02:26First of all, since you asked a question about my bill,
02:32it's prospective, not retroactive.
02:37And the reason it's raised now is if I had raised this bill a year or two ago
02:44when nobody was talking about tariffs,
02:45who would care what Grassley wants to do about recapturing the constitutional power of Congress
02:52to regulate interstate and foreign commerce?
02:55But now Trump has raised the issue of tariffs.
03:00It gives me a chance to make up for the mistakes that were done in 63 and 74.
03:08And remember, from 1954 until 1981, Democrats controlled both houses of Congress
03:16for all those years, and they passed tariff bills in 63 and 74
03:23that basically gave away Congress's power to regulate interstate and foreign commerce
03:29to a president, whoever he is.
03:32And both Republicans and Democrats have exercised some of that power.
03:40So this is my attempt to recapture that power for the Congress of the United States
03:47where it shouldn't have been given up in the first place.