Congress is gearing up for its lame duck session, where Democrats will try to accomplish as much of their agenda as they can before America is forced to suffer through two long years of a Teahadist House majority and obstructionist Senate minority.
The Democrats have a lot to work through in the lame duck session: passing the defense authorization (apparently sans DADT or the DREAM Act, sadly), the START treaty, the expiration of the Bush tax cuts, extending unemployment insurance, and the list goes on.
My question: with such an impressive list of issues to deal with in such a short time, will the Senate forget about the black farmers?
For more than a generation, the USDA systematically denied black farmers the loans, disaster assistance, and other forms of aid that are farming's lifeblood. With this aid, a farmer can make repair equipment, purchase seed or fertilizer, and have a productive year. Without it, their field lie fallow and they can't earn enough money to make their mortgage payments.
During the 1980s, Black farmers would file discrimination complaints with the USDA's civil rights office -- but that office, which already had a backlog of complaints, had been dismantled by the Ronald Reagan. Most of these complaints never received even minimal scrutiny, and the number of black farmers dwindled as they unjustly lost their land to foreclosure.
And so it went for years, until a North Carolina farmer named Timothy Pigford filed a lawsuit against the USDA seeking damages for the discrimination he'd suffered. The presiding judge later "certified as a class all black farmers who filed discrimination complaints against the USDA between 1983 and 1997." The government settled with the farmers and paid out damages on 16,000 claims -- but many more claims were not filed by the deadline, and were never heard.
As a Senator, President Obama worked with Chuck Grassley to secure new opportunities for the remaining claimants to have their cases heard. And as President, Obama’s Justice Department negotiated a $1.15 billion settlement with the remaining claimants. But Republican obstruction has kept the settlement from being funded. First Tom Coburn (R-OK) blocked a unanimous consent vote because the settlement wasn’t paid for. John Barasso (R-WY) later objected because the black farmers settlement was tied to a similar settlement for Native American farmers, and he was concerned about attorney’s fees. Then, after Coburn and Barasso’s concerns were alleviated, Coburn blocked it again. Why? Because he could.
So now, as Congress enters the lame duck session and we’re hearing folks talking about a wide range of legislative priorities, it seems that no one is talking about the black farmers, and righting years of injustice. It seems like there's a lot of silence around the farmers and their plight right now. Let’s hope that doesn't remain the case. It’s been too long a wait for these farmers