Sec. Rollins scraps and rebrands USDA’s Climate Smart Program

Secretary Rollins has renamed the program the ‘Advancing Markets for Producers’ initiative

Ag Secretary Brooke Rollins is canceling the Biden-era USDA Climate Smart Program, calling it a “slush fund.”

It is being renamed and comes with major changes in how the money is spent.

Secretary Rollins says her Department went through the Partnerships for Climate Smart Commodoties program line by line and found farmers and ranchers were being left with little help after various fees. She has renamed the program the Advancing Markets for Producers initiative.

USDA will review any exisitng grants, making sure they meet certain critera. The largest being 65 percent of federal dollars must go to producers.

Rollins says the prior program was largely built as a “green new scam” that did not benefit American farmers.

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