First, the Trump administration implemented tariffs on imported good starting in 2025.
Then, faced with average U.S. ground beef prices of $6.88 a pound, President Donald Trump announced Friday that the nation would allow up to 300,000 metric tons of ground beef to be imported for the next 90 days without out-of-quota tariffs from unspecified countries.
“I don’t want to say which countries — but there are a few countries — but they’re going to be sending in the highest quality beef, and it’s something that we need,” Trump told the media.
Wyoming ranchers interviewed Friday by Cowboy State Daily say this is not the way.
“It’s certainly negative in its impact,” said Jim Magagna, executive vice president at the Wyoming Stock Growers Association, of the announcement. “We don’t know what tariffs (are lifting), with whom.”
Magagna said the announcement is impacting the market, though real market measures remain unknown, which “may or may not have a lasting impact” on the beef economy.
Magagna said the better way to help the consumer contend with high prices while not starving out American beef growers is to unbridle the American market to increase production.
That supply increase will drive prices down, even while American herds grow in size, he said.
“It’s a supply and demand market,” said Magagna. “It shouldn’t be driven by extraneous government policy.”
Where You At, Feds?
At a June meeting of the Joint Agriculture, State and Public Lands & Water Resources Committee, Wyoming Department of Agriculture Director Doug Miyamoto described the federal restrictions that fall on Wyoming growers.
“One (deregulation) that I’ve been pushing for a long time … is eligibility for interstate sale of state-inspected product,” said Miyamoto.
He said the federal government won’t allow interstate sale of merely state-inspected products, “even though they’ve said, ‘Your program is equal to the federal program.'
“Well, if it’s equal-to, why are we constrained from sales?” asked Miyamoto.
He added that Argentina, having achieved equal-to status, can sell beef anywhere in the U.S. — but Wyoming can’t.
“That’s where we’re at with our federal laws,” he added.
Dying Off
Mitch Benson, a Fremont County beef producer, told Cowboy State Daily on Friday that he doesn’t believe the American cattle herd will ever be rebuilt.
“It’s just the direction everything’s headed,” said Benson.
He said U.S. Forest Service permits for about two decades have been awarded to environmentalists, who in turn “have retired those grazing permits.”
“You can’t rebuild the U.S. cattle herd if we ranchers don’t have a place to run our livestock,” said Benson.
Dalton Banks, a rancher who chairs the House Agriculture Committee, said Trump’s announcement only exacerbates the drought and skyrocketing hay prices growers already face.
“So, flooding the market with cheap foreign beef, I think, is just going to make it harder on us,” said Banks. “Really, that’s just the wrong way to go about it.”
Banks said flooding the market will cause higher prices in the long run, by starving off more domestic cattle ranches.
He said the committee is studying policies favoring country-of-origin labeling, so people who prefer U.S. beef can buy it knowingly.
“I’d just encourage people to buy U.S. beef and Wyoming beef, even with the stuff coming in, it’s really supporting the people that give back to the communities and give back to the state,” said Banks. “That’s just kind of my plea to everybody.”
Yeah But Tariffs Raise Prices Anyway
Tyler Lindholm, who is the director of the Wyoming chapter of Americans for Prosperity and also a fifth-generation Wyoming rancher, said the Trump maneuver is a “two-part story.”
Lindholm voiced disagreement with tariffs in the first place.
“So, suspending tariffs, he’s admitting that tariffs raise prices for Americans,” said Lindholm. “Thank you, President Trump, for finally admitting that.”
But the nation would be better off letting Wyoming sell state-inspected goods across state lines, added Lindholm — in a similar vein to Miyamoto’s point from the June meeting.
He said the federal government should also unleash beef sales directly from producer to consumer.
That “would drastically reduce the price of beef and open up the product to be sold to Americans,” said Lindholm.
Clair McFarland can be reached at clair@cowboystatedaily.com.
