Trump’s trade war has hurt farmers. There are new warning signs for Republicans.

President Donald Trump promised a “golden age” of American agriculture. Farm-state Republicans are feeling pressure to make a down payment before the midterms.

Over the past five months, the Trump administration has rolled out trade agreements it says will give farmers access to new markets and reopened Chinese purchases of millions of pounds of soybeans after a trade war-induced, monthslong boycott. It also spearheaded an effort to get $12 billion in direct payments to farmers to recover some of their losses amid the president’s trade war.

But farmers’ sentiment about their industry has seen declines over a similar stretch, according to a monthly survey conducted by Purdue University — the predominant way their perception of the U.S. agricultural economy is tracked — and new data shows farm bankruptcies soaring.

Republicans from rural America are warning that one of their key voter bases could sit out this election year, a blow for a party already facing stiff political headwinds.

“The anxiety, the anxiousness, the angst, the timing is all something that is really weighing on producers,” said Sen. Jerry Moran (R-Kan.), who said he believed the circumstances farmers in his state are experiencing are the “most difficult that I’ve seen in my time as an elected official.”

Republican lawmakers from food-producing states are pushing for more farm aid and expanded access to foreign markets in 2026, updated agriculture policy and increased ethanol sales, with the aim of shoring up rural support in swing states like North Carolina, Wisconsin and Michigan.

“We have got to do more now,” said Sen. Jim Justice (R-W.Va.). “If Republicans are not worried about the midterms, then they’re living in a cave.”

Rural voters — whether farmers themselves or simply adjacent to the industry — have repeatedly turned out in droves to support Trump in the past.

“The question is not, ‘Are they going to suddenly flip to Democrat?’” said Brian Reisinger, a former GOP consultant who’s now a Wisconsin-based rural policy expert. “The question is, ‘Are they going to be as motivated and as moved by the direction of [Republicans’] policy agenda now as they were in 2016 or in 2024?’”

Purdue’s farmer sentiment barometer showed that farmers' future expectations worsened in February, reaching their lowest level since September 2024. And 44 percent of the farmers surveyed said their operations were worse off in February 2026 than a year ago.

Democrats are already sensing an opening.

The Democratic National Committee has highlighted how the administration’s policies are affecting farmers, including blasting out farm bankruptcy reports to journalists in major swing states like Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania.

“[Farmers] know that this administration has caused a lot of pain for them, and I can tell you that they're pissed off in my district,” said Rep. Gabe Vasquez (D-N.M.).

Trump has acknowledged that his aggressive tariff regime has hurt farmers, driving up costs for things like fertilizer and machinery while prompting retaliation from major trading partners.

The president said in September that farmers “are, for a little while, going to be hurt until the tariffs kick into their benefit.”

“I don’t know that any of this is about the president,” said Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.). “I just think that some of this is long-standing. The market access issue is a long-standing issue, and I can tell you that farmers complained bitterly, and rightly in my view, about the trade rep in the last administration, who they thought did nothing to open new markets for them.”

White House spokesperson Anna Kelly said in a statement that Trump is "helping our agriculture industry by cooling inflation, negotiating fair trade deals to open new export markets, and boosting the farm safety net for the first time in a decade."

A Department of Agriculture spokesperson said that “President Trump is the most pro-farmer President of our lifetime,” touting farm safety net improvements and “over two dozen trade deals boosting ag market access and exports.”

“President Trump is utilizing all the tools available to ensure farmers have what they need to continue their farming operations, and that includes expanding the domestic biofuels market,” the spokesperson said.

Besides touting a USDA farm aid program that would largely benefit producers of row crops like corn, soy, rice and cotton, the administration has exempted most fertilizers from Trump's tariffs. Its trade truce with China, meanwhile, ended Beijing's freeze on U.S. soybean purchases — until that blockade, China was far and away the largest foreign buyer of American soy crops.

The administration has also pointed to a series of trade agreements it struck over the past year — many of which include language about reducing barriers to American agricultural goods overseas.

Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins and U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer recently penned an op-ed in The Hill arguing that the administration's trade policies have been "leveling the playing field for U.S. food and agricultural exports."

But, because many of those agreements have yet to be finalized, let alone implemented, they have done little to assuage producers struggling to access new export markets. After the U.S. struck a trade agreement lowering tariffs on some U.S. agricultural goods with India — a country seen as a potentially lucrative new market — Indian officials quickly attempted to reassure a domestic audience that the deal wouldn’t allow any products that are already grown in the country.

“Our farmers are feeling a world of hurt because of these chaotic trade policies, and they're not getting us closer to fair trade,” Iowa Farmers Union President Aaron Lehman said in an interview. “So we need to have a much more rational approach that puts farmers' interests front and center and not being used as political pawns.”

The pressure on farmers has already taken a toll. There were 15,000 fewer farms at the end of 2025, according to the USDA, compared with the same point in 2024. Farm bankruptcies also increased by 46 percent year-over-year in 2025, according to data released last month by the American Farm Bureau Federation, one of the industry's most influential lobbying groups.

The figures are at their highest since 2020 — the peak of the Covid-19 pandemic, when the global economy was retracting and supply chains were paralyzed. This time, the economic fallout for farmers, many of whom have been grappling with back-to-back years of financial losses, has been exacerbated by presidential policies.

In the absence of deals that substantially open new markets, lawmakers are pushing for a series of legislative actions that could provide financial support for farmers — ranging from tariff rebate checks to programs that can expand domestic demand for crops.

“I’d love to see some of the tariff money be used to continue to help farmers who have really borne the brunt of retaliation,” Hawley said.

Farm-state Republicans are also rushing to champion a handful of industry-friendly priorities, including allowing year-round sales of E15 fuel and a new round of farm economic aid they’d like to land at farmers’ feet before November.

Sen. John Hoeven (R-N.D.), who chairs the Senate subcommittee that oversees agriculture spending, said GOP lawmakers will need to get “aggressive” about securing new policies in the coming months to bolster farmers — like permitting the sale of year-round E15, as Trump promised during a recent trip to Iowa.

“Remember us for the midterms,” Trump said after pledging that congressional leaders would pass a bill allowing increased ethanol sales to expand corn markets, a key sector in Iowa.

Hoeven and Senate Agriculture Chair John Boozman (R-Ark.) have crafted a plan to allocate another $15 billion in aid. They’re hoping to attach it to a supplemental disaster appropriations package this spring, though the timing is still uncertain amid competing priorities.

Others, like House Agriculture Chair G.T. Thompson (R-Pa.), are pinning their hopes on passing a new farm bill, which Thompson said would be a “morale boost” for rural America ahead of the midterms. But that bill is mired in intraparty fights about pesticides and livestock and Democrats’ reservations about voting for the GOP-led bill.

In the meantime, Republicans are hoping that provisions in last year’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act that kick in Oct. 1 — like increases to crop insurance and other farm safety net programs and tax cuts that farm groups want — will keep farmers happy through November.

“They're in a very difficult situation,” Boozman said of farmers. “Congress has stepped up so far all that it can, and I think that the farmers understand that.”

Rachel Shin contributed to this report.