Two 'Regen' Farmers Walk Into An Oval Office Debate Blind-Sided

President Michael Gooden, head of VicNoTill and a leading regenerative farmer in Australia, was on the phone with me the other day asking if I’d heard the big news.

And on waking the following morning, one of the best podcasts I found while touring the US recently, Why Should I Trust You, a weekly podcast looking at ‘why so many Americans mistrust the system and how we can trust each other again’, turned up in my feed. It led off with this:

On the very day the Supreme Court handed a major legal victory to Bayer Monsanto, a ruling backed by the Trump administration but viewed by many in the MAHA movement as a betrayal, two regenerative farmers were invited to the Oval Office.

Those two regenerative farmers are legendary. Will Harris from White Oak Pastures in Georgia, and former USDA scientist from South Dakota Dr Jonathan Lundgren.

I saw Lundgren present at the 2024 Regenerate Conference in Denver to powerful effect. This happened to be on the very day Trump won back office. There were a range of emotions in the room that day, evidenced in the podcast I beamed out. That episode was titled ‘A Force for Mending?’, with reference to the possibilities and persistent hope people felt to be inherent in regenerative farming.

Whoever got Lundgren into the Oval Office on this day pulled off a master stroke. Politico (the only non-farming related media to cover the story, from what I can tell) reported a person close to the White House, granted anonymity to discuss its inner workings candidly, said “The president likes watching people squirm a little. The people who handle it well get rewarded.”

It seems Lundgren was just the guy, with the elder Harris by his side. The Why Should I Trust You podcast primer continued:

They expected to witness President Trump sign an executive order [EO] promoting the kind of farming they’ve spent decades championing: bringing the natural ecosystem back to the farm, and thus restoring soil health and reducing reliance on pesticides.

Instead, they found themselves in the middle of a last-minute policy debate involving President Trump, HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins, and Farm Bureau President Zippy Duvall.

Lundgren actually says the invitation was to:

… come to the newly paved Rose Garden of the White House for a dinner in honor of American Farmers. Four of us farmers were told that there may also be an Executive Order regarding regenerative agriculture signed, and the President wanted to discuss it with us.

Neither Lundgren nor Harris had seen the EO ahead of the meeting. Lundgren expected nothing more than a photo op, and “For a week prior to the event, I laid awake at night trying to decide what to do…. Was I just being used to greenwash the administration’s recent contrary decisions?”

What they found was a live situation to which they ended up being pivotal.

The EO is titled ‘ADVANCING REGENERATIVE AGRICULTURE AND STRENGTHENING AMERICAN FARM RESILIENCE’. And it was Farm Bureau chief Duvall arguing it down, as Trump literally held pen in hand.

It appeared to Harris and Lundgren that the President didn’t really know much about the Supreme Court ruling, or the EO. He seemed surprised at a lot of what was being said. Lundgren wrote:

“But the farmers need these sprays, don’t they?” the President asked. “I am an entomologist, Mr. President. I have been in their fields. No, they do not need these sprays.” It isn’t very often that being an entomologist has come in so handy.

The farmers said Duvall threatened the President with the loss of the Farm Bureau vote, and Lundgren felt like he was threatening him with the loss of a friendship too. It was clear HHS was driving the moment, in part advocating some ‘MAHA triage’ after the Supreme Court decision.

The Farm Bureau later reportedly communicated that Duvall is ‘not against regenerative agriculture, but against the insinuation that the current system makes people sick.’

Lundgren doesn’t think Duvall understands regenerative farming and what’s at stake. And when he saw his moment, he let rip with what his non-profit, Ecdysis Foundation, has found through visiting 2,000 farms across the U.S. over the past 4.5 years:

Mr. President, the most striking data we have generated from our work is that row croppers in the U.S. have twice the asthma rates, 3 times the clinical depression, 3 times the cancer rate, and a 2,600 fold increase in Parkinson’s rates compared to the rest of society. We are killing our farmers.

But regenerative agriculture is a huge win for farmers. 90% of regenerative row crop farmers have abandoned all insecticides and fertilizers. Two-thirds have abandoned all synthetic fertilizers and herbicides.

The protein content of the wheat produced is twice as high as conventional wheat tested. Regenerative wheat yields are equivalent to national averages, and the profit potential is higher. This is the answer that American farmers have been looking for.”

The EO was signed.

The hosts of the Why Should I Trust You podcast put it this way:

The Administration is committed to regenerative farming. It instructs the EPA to prioritise reviewing and approving alternatives to conventional pesticides and reassess whether chemicals used for drying before harvesting still meet today’s safety standards.

It directs Cabinet Secretaries to expedite research into the cumulative exposure of chemicals (all the chemicals on the farm). It tells HHS [the US Department of Health and Human Services] to launch an NIH [National Institutes of Health] contest for creative ways to evaluate this, and prioritise research that reduces reliance on ‘conventional chemical protection tools’.

It instructs the Secretary of Agriculture to max out funding of the current regenerative agriculture pilot program (introduced last December) … for transition support for farmers … expanding reach with partnerships [etc.].

And Lundgren, in his post:

The Executive Order on Regenerative Agriculture can instigate major investment by the administration into regenerative agriculture, and put agrichemicals and their human health costs under scrutiny. Soil health and conservation agriculture have been a weak afterthought of decades of legislation, current politics included. For the first time in my life, more voters than I have ever seen are voting not for a party, but for a food system that can keep their families and communities safe.

He also wrote:

Agriculture Secretary Rollins was cautiously supportive.

I had previously heard Marion Nestle’s fascinating presentation on The Real Organic podcast in May describing how, amongst plenty of curiosity and critique of this administration, Secretaries Rollins and Kennedy had been touring rural communities together. How I’d love to see our Agriculture and Health Ministers doing that in Australia.

Will Harris calls himself apolitical, someone who doesn’t pay much attention to politics, though he says he probably should. He calls this EO the “greatest indicator that maybe we’ve got a true innovation here.” Not just “niche marketing”.

I’ve been in this transition for nearly 30 years [having been a heavy industrial farmer] and it’s the first time that I’ve seen a politician of any stature take this much of a stand on regenerative farming. So do I trust any politician to not change their mind …? No … but I am encouraged by this show of support…. It’s the most support we’ve ever had.

For Lundgren’s part, he voiced despair about both major parties failing farmers, along with lands and waters, food and public health, decade on decade. “We’re worse off than ever.” They’ve heard plenty before, they say. And most of what Trump has done to date has made things worse. “Maybe this is lip service too.”

But things have to change. “We see bailout after bailout,” Lundgren said. Multiple billions of dollars in each of the last two years alone. Contrary to the arguments often cited against regenerative agriculture, it’s the industrial agriculture model that isn’t viable or realistic.

Alongside the bailouts are the enormous subsidies and insurance rackets in how the system ‘normally’ runs. Harris described how almost all insurance monies “pass straight through” to the companies. Lundgren told of a farmer friend who said: “Every year I borrow $850,000 to make $50,000.” Lundgren asked: “Where’s the other 800 grand going?”

Since the EO just a couple of weeks ago, Lundgren says he’s already hearing from more industrial farmers - ‘so this regen ag thing …’.

And on leaving the Oval Office, Lundgren and Harris made clear to Duvall they didn’t see him as the enemy. Harris has known him for 30 years back in Georgia. And Lundgren wrote:

I think it needs to be clear. Farm Bureau and Mr. Duvall aren’t enemies here. Conventional farmers are not enemies here. Consolidated, corporate agriculture is how we got here. Greed is our enemy. A cultural movement away from our families, communities, and the natural world that produces our food is the enemy. Farmers and consumers never win in a globalized, industrial food system.

As we left the White House, Mr. Duvall explained that he knew that our little band of farmers were trail blazers. “Farmers don’t need the government telling them what they can and can’t put on their fields.” He explained. “The trouble comes when what they spray on their fields makes my family sick.” I said.

We left the conversation with me saying “If we are trail blazers, and this is the future, then we need you, Mr. Duvall. We need your help. Let me talk to the farmers of Farm Bureau.” Because regenerative agriculture is not scary; but it is different. He said he would call to set something up. And I hope he does.

If regenerative farming is a force for mending, as I and so many others are increasingly observing, across political and other spectra, then this is how it happens. Ultimately, it could be the next meeting that proves to be the biggest outcome of this one.