Biden chose Wilsk because he was a member of the USDA. “Anyone with a deep knowledge of the operation of the department can quickly address the need for food aid to rural communities, farmers and low-income families during an epidemic,” said a person familiar with Biden’s thinking. . This person is a USDA. He also drew attention to the work of Willis Ack, establishing the department’s first minority farmer advisory committee and creating advocacy and outreach fees to serve small, start-up and socially disadvantaged farmers.
The man said, “No one knows the department better than Tom Wilsk.
While Wilson’s critique of racial equity is well-founded and despair runs deep on the left, the opposition is not expected to threaten his path to confirmation. The previous two-time Iowa governor, who served eight years as the Obama administration’s secretary of agriculture, passed the ratification process in 2009 with unanimous approval in the Senate.
Part of the upheaval, which has been building for weeks, is fraught with excitement, as the larger and more diverse coalition publicly urged Biden to choose the Ohio Democrat and longtime leader of the House Agriculture Committee, who would be the first black woman to lead. Section.
Dozens of groups signed a letter supporting Luz, demonstrating their policy experience and previous commitment to black farmers. House Majority Whip Jim Cleiburn, a senior member of the Black Caucus in Congress who backed Biden ahead of the South Carolina primary, also repeatedly urged Biden to choose Fudge for the role.
Instead, Biden’s team opted to put Fudge on top of the Housing and Urban Development Department, which Fujid himself had previously noted was one of the few departments generally chosen to oversee people of color. When Fuj’s supporters said they were confident she would do a spectacular job led by HUD, she slammed Congressman’s widespread hunger for food and the A.G. He expressed surprise at the decision given the work of the policy. She did well to draw the USDA in particular.
Biden, chosen to serve as senior adviser to the president, Vice-President-elect Kamala Harris and Rep. Top civil rights leaders who met virtually with Cedric Richmond (D-La.) Came out hours later with news of Wilsek’s choice. No agricultural or rural groups were on the call, but NAACP President and CEO Derrick Johnson expressed concern over reports that Wilsk was again at the forefront of leading the USDA.
Johnson warned the president-elect and his team that, according to a source on the call: Picking Wilson would have a negative reaction in two razor-thin Senate races in Georgia. Black voters, and especially rural black voters, have not forgotten that Georgia’s former USDA head of rural development and well-known civil rights leader, Shirley Sherod, was wrongly fired from her job under Wilsack’s leadership after a misleadingly edited video. The falsehoods shown on Bretbart indicate that he is racist.
Once the full video of Sherrod’s comment came to light, both Wilsec and the White House apologized for expelling him. (Emails later show that the White House was heavily involved in Sherod’s firing, although officials denied it at the time.)
In a nearly 0-minute zoom meeting, Biden listened to concerns, quietly taking notes, but when Johnson specifically called President-elect Sherod to discuss Wilsek’s choice, Biden was spotted and withdrawn. Perhaps the former vice president suggested that the black community began to understand how upset they were about the episode a decade later.
Johnson brought him back to the meeting later, the source said. The president-elect should indeed call Sherrod, Johnson said, arguing that it is not just a moral issue, but that electing Wilsec could be detrimental in Georgia.
Biden told leaders on the call that he believed they would be happy with the cabinet as a whole, while naming the remaining nominees, and urged not to discriminate against Wilsec, the source said. The transition has so far named 12 cabinet members, eight of whom are colored and six women.
A source familiar with Wilsk’s thinking told Politico that if he is nominated for leadership of the department, he relies on people like Sherod and others for guidance. Wilsek has worked to improve his relationship with Sherod since the incident and has sought her advice ever since, the source said.
John Byrd, president of the National Black Farmers Association, said he was disappointed to learn from news reports about both civil rights leaders and Wilsek’s nomination after months of working with Biden’s campaign and his transition team. Boyd has reached out to Wilsk and wants to communicate to find out how he plans to address land and credit addresses, increase access to color and more farmers.
“I hope it comes with a different outlook for the next four years than it was in the first eight years of the USDA and resolving issues concerning blacks, other minorities and small farmers.” “There has to be some real initiative and focus that is going to come from it. He will do nothing if the agency does not come from him. ”
Byrd is optimistic that Wilzak would be a better option than current USDA Secretary Sony Perdue, who says there has been little support for black and small-scale farmers.
“I certainly hope that this administration and the president-elect will hold Wills accountable for these issues.” “I am hopeful that if we take part in the problems, we will be able to run to the top. We didn’t have an avenue with the Trump administration. “
However, not everyone is giving the president-elect and his nominee the benefit of the doubt. USDA of Minority Employees Coalition President Lawrence Lucas and the USDA. Lloyd Wright, the former director of civil rights, has written to Biden asking him to reconsider his nomination.
“When it comes to membership issues, it was one of the worst I came in contact with. What we don’t want is for Wilsk to return, “Wright told Politico.
Wright’s letter outlines the main findings of a counter-investigation report showing that between 2013 and 2015, 7 percent of microloans went to black farmers and less than 0.2 percent of USDA’s 7 7.7 billion loan in 2015 went to black farmers, among other inequalities. Meanwhile, black farmers were excluded from access to land and capital.
Investigations have found that the Obama administration distorted government data to falsely indicate that there was a renaissance of black upbringing under Wills undercover, who often attempted a “new era for civil rights” in the department when discrimination continued and changed little. Was.
Long before the Obama administration, the USDA had a proven track record of discriminating against socially disadvantaged farmers, denying them equal access to important programs that help growers survive during good times and bad times. After several lawsuits, the department has paid billions to settle discrimination claims of class action against African American, Hispanic, Native American and women farmers.
Wilsk did not respond to a request for comment. A person close to Biden noted that during Wilzak’s tenure, the department worked on a number of equity issues. USDA The main class disposed of discrimination cases of action to provide partial compensation to farmers and received fewer complaints about unequal treatment from employees and farmers during the Obama administration, according to USDA’s own data. However, this data has since been questioned. Top officials of the department also signed a memorandum of understanding with the National Black Farmers Association to help black farmers maintain their land, among other actions.
According to a 20th Century study by Data for Progress, black farmers were systematically denied loans and credit, lacked legal protection against fraud, and lost 90 percent of their blacks as a result of “full acts of violence and intimidation.” . Homeland farmland.
Today, according to the 2017 agricultural census, the average size of farm owned by a white producer was 431 acres and the average size owned by a black or African American producer was only 132 acres.
While the number of white farmers has remained constant, the number of colored farmers has declined sharply over time.
Rudy Aredondo, president of the National Latino Farmers and Ranchers Trade Association, said there was no consequence for the discriminatory actions, which were so well documented by the USDA. “To date, no results have been obtained. Meanwhile some of the prospects there are still in office fees. ”
Arerando said that during Wilsk’s eight years at the USDA, he never met with his organization, which, despite repeated requests and invitations to the group’s annual conference in New Mexico in 2015, never met with his organization, which represents about 75,000 Latino producers nationwide. Is.
“Our prospect of being ignored by Mr Wilsec is unlikely to continue,” he said.
Nevertheless, during Wilseck’s tenure, he established good relations with the United Farm Workers Union, through Arturo Rodriguez, the former longtime president of the organization. Rodriguez himself gained traction in the Hispanic Caucus of Congress, whose members saw the leadership of someone with deep experience advocating for USDA-led farm labor.
“When [Vilsack] Until that time, he became Secretary of Agriculture, appointing one of the United Farm Workers to the U.S. He was not invited to the Department of Agriculture, ”Rodriguez told Politico. “He was the first person to ever reach us.”
Willisk supported UFW’s rally among California legislators to help pass a law that would give farm workers higher pay, Rodriguez said, and he would also raise the issue of the need to give legal status to immigrant workers.
The former top Wilsack aide told Politico that he believes “the picture painted about Secretary Wilsack is not accurate.”
“I think a lot more work needs to be done and that’s one of the reasons Wilsk wants to return to the USDA, because with the issues of equity, especially the business is incomplete,” the assistant said.
However, the U.S. Involvement in the willows industry through his job as head of the Dairy Export Council also worries some, like Gary Grant, president of the Black Farmers and Agriculturalists Association, who says he definitely doesn’t want them back.
“We need to refresh someone who has a record of serving and serving the underworld. I know Wilzak is not good. He did nothing when he was first there, so why would he do anything now? ”Grant said. “If someone doesn’t have a real understanding of family farming, it’s not a corporate size entity, then they don’t have ideas to help us.”
Given their track record under the Obama administration, individual producers such as Grady, Black Farmer in the Ark, Black Farmer in the Ark, Abraham Carpenter Jr. also said they would not support Wilsak for the position, given their track record under the Obama administration.
“Now, JB Dan was a party to that situation, but he was just the vice president and maybe he wouldn’t have the power, but now he doesn’t have an excuse,” Carpenter said. “If he has no excuse, it’s time to treat black farmers fairly and give them the justice they deserve.”
Carpenter agrees that Wilsk’s track record doesn’t give him a good start to the role.
“He had the opportunity for many years to do the right thing, and he didn’t,” Carpenter said. “Why should I put him back when he worked against us? And if he doesn’t work against me, he certainly hasn’t helped me. ”
