Can anything make farmers turn away from President Donald Trump?

How right-wing populism has gripped rural areas, especially among farmers, is evidenced by the results from the past few presidential elections.

Still, critical challenges are emerging for key constituencies in Trump's base, principally due to the damage that the Iran War is doing in the countryside. Similar conditions pushed Irish farmers to the streets in early April, causing a change among political leadership shortly after, and also helping producers receive some much-needed relief.

That Irish farmers took to the streets shouldn't surprise folks. Earlier this year in January, some of them were also demonstrating, but against the EU-Mercosur trade deal. Not too long ago in 2024, their counterparts across the English Channel throughout many European countries staged weeks of actions to protest free trade deals and excessive bureaucratic regulations. Outside of Europe, in Mexico beginning in 2025 and continuing into 2026, farmers, for many of the same reasons, are blocking roads to demand government intervention to address falling prices for their produce.

The Iran War is placing unnecessary stress on farmers and most other working people. Such conditions are similar to those in Ireland, which led farmers to find common cause with others.

Taking a quick glance at these recent protests taking place around the world, farmers in the United States seem to be asleep at the wheel as producers in many other countries are taking control by challenging their governments and calling for economic justice.

It is not the case that farmers in the US are living large.

In 2025, farm bankruptcies rose by 46% compared with 2024. In 2026, even though there appears to be some movement in a positive direction concerning prices for corn and soy farmers, the jump in what they have to pay for fuel and fertilizer caused by how the Iran War devastates global supply chains is eating into their profits.

Making matters worse, the fertilizer industry is heavily concentrated. A standard metric for measuring concentration—the four-firm concentration ratio (CR4)—shows that the leading four companies in fertilizer markets control about 75% of sales. When that figure is above 40% within a certain industry, according to researchers, then illegal practices such as price-fixing become endemic and consumers pay more than they should at the register. Put simply, the negative economic impacts from the Iran War are compounded by an industry looking for excuses to further jack up prices.

Meanwhile, the current version of the Farm Bill in Congress woefully fails to meet the needs of a farm economy facing crisis.

First, pricing policy to support farmers was decided last year in the One Big Beautiful Bill (OBBB) when the surge in input prices was not on the political radar. Adding insult to injury........

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