Trump's Beef Tariff Pause Angers US Ranchers and Boosts Brazilian Imports

United States President Donald Trump in late August announced a 90-day pause on certain beef tariffs, making beef cheaper to import, particularly from Brazil. The decision was framed as a way to bring down prices for consumers, but it landed as a betrayal for many US ranchers, who were getting ready to take their cattle to market.

The impact on ranchers was immediate: prices at cattle auctions plummeted, temporarily lowering ranchers' profits. The United States Cattlemen's Association, the National Cattlemen's Beef Association and the Farm Bureau, all member organisations that represent ranchers, opposed the decision. It is too soon to tell how the decision will ultimately affect grocery prices.

Rural Republican members of Congress also distanced themselves from the decision, but it is not yet clear how ranchers will vote in the midterms, or whether those votes will decide races.

Chad Basinger, a rancher in Pretty Prairie, Kansas, is sceptical that the imports will have a significant impact. He said some people have said they will vote for the other party, will not vote, or that the administration has let them down, so some will swing the other way in the midterms, but overall he did not think it would be that much.

Basinger also said ranchers will be weighing the administration's other actions, such as the $8bn in farm relief announced in Kansas on October 19. His own House of Representatives district in Kansas is expected to remain safely Republican in the midterms, but Kansas faces an unexpectedly tight Senate race and potential swing districts in Montana, Iowa, Texas and Colorado are all in cattle country.

Still, it is unlikely that ranchers alone will decide elections. America's cattle herd is near its smallest size since 1951 and the number of ranchers has declined alongside the number of livestock. Observers worry that ongoing uncertainty fuelled by tariffs, fuel prices and drought may cause the ranching population to shrink further.

David Anderson, an agricultural economist at Texas A&M University who advises ranchers, said high prices this year should have given ranchers the confidence to invest in the future and expand their herds, but making imports cheaper may have helped nudge ranchers in the opposite direction. He said it really works against the market signal to expand and produce more domestically, and that got a lot of people pretty angry.

This is not the first time Trump's tariffs have impacted cattle supplies. Last year, the president added a 50 percent tariff on Brazil, a key trade partner for beef, raising the cost of importing Brazilian lean beef, which is often mixed with fatty US beef to make hamburger patties. In February, Trump allowed more tariff-free beef imports from Argentina, and in August he did the same for Brazil and Paraguay. Both tariff changes led to swift price swings in cattle futures markets.

Cattle prices also moved this year in response to more fundamental drivers: plant closures by meatpackers, labour shortages late last month related to ICE actions at Kansas packing plants, the second-largest in the country, and the reopening of the southern border after a closure due to New World screwworm disease.

In the big picture, the shrinking US cattle herd has less to do with short-term price changes and more to do with drought cycles, which are growing more intense as warming temperatures increase evaporation. Still, tariff changes add uncertainty. Anderson said this has been a hot topic for the last six weeks and just adds a little more uncertainty, volatility, worries or stress.

Basinger said that for many established ranchers, the tariff announcement was frustrating but not existential, and they are not going to change their strategy. Where price volatility may matter more, he said, is for the next generation, as most of today's ranchers are eyeing retirement and their heirs must decide whether to make a go of ranching or sell their family's land.

This year, low US cattle supplies meant ranchers commanded record-high cattle prices despite added imports, but high revenue does not always mean huge profits: many ranchers operate at a loss for years in a row and rely on a few good years to pay down debts or expand their herds. This year ranchers also faced high loan interest rates, extra fuel and fertiliser costs due to the war with Iran, higher feed costs from drought, and destructive wildfires in Kansas and Nebraska. Basinger said cow-and-calf ranchers generally did well this year and in Kansas are using profits for repairs and upgrades, but it needs to help for a little longer. Anderson said ranchers had hoped 2026 would be a turnaround year, but so far there is not much evidence of herd expansion.