MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:
President Trump hosted farmers in the White House Rose Garden last night, where he discussed wanting to give them more federal aid.
LEILA FADEL, HOST:
It's part of an effort to shore up the president's relationships with a group that had been part of his base ahead of November elections after tariffs and the Iran war has squeezed their finances.
MARTIN: NPR's Danielle Kurtzleben is here to tell us more about this. Good morning, Danielle.
DANIELLE KURTZLEBEN, BYLINE: Good morning.
MARTIN: What did the president have to say to the farmers?
KURTZLEBEN: Well, first off, Trump likes to talk about people supporting him. And farmers have heavily supported him in the past, so that came up multiple times.
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PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: From the day I ran, for some reason, you liked me. I came from the city - a city slicker. And from the day I ran, you liked me, and from the day I ran, I liked you.
KURTZLEBEN: But beyond that, he talked about a few policy proposals, including that $11 billion in farm aid he wants now. Now, if Congress approves that, it would be in addition to $12 billion in aid paid out earlier this year. And like you said, this all comes amid a wave of White House attention on farmers. There was a farmer roundtable in Wisconsin a few weeks ago. And Trump's administration has proposed a plan that would essentially force Iran to buy U.S. ag products, though details on that are very sketchy right now. And Trump is pushing to allow higher-ethanol fuel to be sold year-round. Now, right now it's not because it can contribute to air pollution during warmer months.
MARTIN: That is a lot of focus on one sort of particular - I don't know - constituency, I guess I would say. But it's also true that the president's own policy decisions have caused problems for this group.
KURTZLEBEN: Well, exactly. Now, it had already been a rough few years for farmers, but Trump's actions this term really didn't help. Tariffs made inputs like equipment more expensive. His trade wars have especially damaged the soybean market, and the war in Iran made fertilizer and diesel more costly, though prices are starting to come down. But people in farm country have lost confidence in the president. One month into this term, rural voters' net approval of Trump was at plus-22 percentage points in the NPR/PBS News/Marist poll. This month, it was at negative 10, so that's a huge slide.
MARTIN: Danielle, can we go back to that proposal you just mentioned about Iran? Can you tell us any more about it?
KURTZLEBEN: Well, not really, because we don't know a lot. What officials have said is that the U.S. and Qatar would oversee any unfrozen assets and use that control to require Iran to buy U.S. corn, soy and wheat. Now, we should say that Iran pretty quickly responded that they wouldn't go along with this, and the idea raises real questions. For example, right now Iran buys food from other countries, including U.S. allies. So it could complicate the U.S.' relationships with those countries if the U.S. muscles them out of the Iranian market. Now, none of that has stopped Trump and other White House officials from talking up this proposal all week. But if it doesn't happen, farmers won't give Trump credit for simply attempting a new policy, says Republican pollster Whit Ayres.
WHIT AYRES: Promises of things that might happen in the future if things all go our way and the Iranians decide to buy a bunch of agricultural products, even though they say they're not going to do so - that's just like smoke and mirrors.
KURTZLEBEN: And as far as aid goes, now, that may make some farmers happier with Trump. But also, a lot of farmers will tell you they just prefer good profits over government checks.
MARTIN: That is NPR's Danielle Kurtzleben. Danielle, thank you.
KURTZLEBEN: Thank you. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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