Call And Email Your U.S. Senators and Representative:

• Locate your U.S. Senators’ contact information here.
• Find your U.S. Representatives’ website and contact information here.

Here’s What To Ask:

1. Ask Congress to support Senate Resolution No. 391 (S. Res. 391) calling for the reinstatement of Country-of-Origin Labeling for beef. A full copy of Senate Resolution No. 391 is available here.
2. Ask Congress to support H.R. 5563 – Opportunities for Fairness in Farming Act of 2020, to prevent USDA checkoff programs from 1) paying organizations that lobby on agricultural issues 2) prohibit anticompetitive behavior 3) ban activity that involves a conflict of interest 4) require audits to ensure compliance. A full copy of the H.R. 5563 Opportunities for Fairness in Farm Act of 2020 is available here.
3. Ask Congress to sponsor new legislation to fully restore Mandatory Country-of-Origin Labeling (M-COOL) for beef. Ask them to review R-CALF USA’s paper ‘Restoring Mandatory COOL for Beef While Mindful of the World Trade Organization’s (WTO’s) Adverse Ruling’ available here. Let the R-CALF USA office know if one or both of your Senators and/or Representative says they will sponsor new legislation to restore Mandatory COOL for beef.

• Contact President Donald Trump online here or call the White House at 202-456-1111 during business hours.

Submit Comments to the USDA:

R-CALF USA urges all of its members to submit public comments by the March 13, 2020 deadline. Members are encouraged to think about examples of preferences or advantages that would benefit only some feeders at the expense of those who do not receive such preference or advantage. As well as examples of prejudices or disadvantages that only some cattle feeders would be subjected to while others are not.

Here are some ideas for agreements or conduct that should be unlawful:

1. A contract not based on price, such as a cost-plus contract.
2. A contract that requires feedlots to sell all their cattle to a single packer.
3. A contract that guarantees to limit a feeder’s losses, such as a stop-loss contract.
4. A per head or per pound bonus for selling exclusively to a single packer.
5. A retaliatory action by a packer because the feeder complained or sold to a different packer.
6. A refusal to pay market price for slaughter-ready cattle.
7. A contract to buy only if the feeder keeps feeding the cattle beyond their optimal weight.
8. A refusal to provide carcass information if such information is provided to others.
9. An offer to finance feeder cattle and or feed at special terms.
10. A refusal to buy on a live-weight basis when the packer buys on a live-weight basis from other feeders.

You may have other examples to include in your comments. For certain, your comments should clearly state that the proposed rule must state that a violation of the undue preference prohibition can occur even if the conduct cannot be demonstrated to harm the competitiveness of the entire industry.

To submit your comments by the March 13, 2020 deadline, the USDA requires all comments to be submitted through the Federal e-rulemaking portal at http://www.regulations.gov. Your comments should reference the docket number docket number and the date and page number of the Federal Register. So, here is what to write at the beginning of your comments:

RE: Docket No. AMS–FTTP–18–0101, 85 Fed. Reg., 1771-1783, Jan. 13, 2020

To view the actual proposed rule, go to http://www.regulations.gov and type in: AMS-FTTP-18-0101.

Good luck with your comments and thank you for your ongoing support.

Spread the Word

Write a letter to the editor of any paper in the U.S.!  Links Newspapers in every state available here.