Break up Big Meat

When they aren’t fixing prices they’re fixing wages

Calls from left and right are building to break up Big Ag as beef prices rise, food plants close and workers are locked out from the slaughterhouse.

Republican Zach Lahn separated himself in the governor’s primary by calling to break up ag conglomerates and clean up our polluted water. Democratic ag secretary candidate Chris Jones argues that small processors can revitalize rural Iowa. Voters are listening and eager.

Last week, the Teamsters union announced it is investigating anti-trust issues in meatpacking on the heels of the Trump Administration settling price-fixing cases involving Cargill and Tyson.

“The beef cartel, comprised of Cargill, Tyson, and a couple other companies, have already been sued for violating anti-trust laws for price fixing and ripping off consumers,” said Jesse Case, director of the Teamsters Food Processing Division (and a Storm Lake native). “Now they’re conspiring to fix labor rates. These large meat packers are monopolies that need to be broken up if they can’t recommit to the communities that helped make them successful.”

Beef is the latest front. Cargill shut down beef operations in Fort Morgan, Colo., amid contract negotiations and locked out 1,700 workers, according to the Teamsters, which filed an unfair labor practices complaint.

It’s not just beef. Last month, the Trump Administration announced a settlement with AgriStats in an anti-trust case involving pork and poultry. AgriStats shares data among meat companies like Tyson and Cargill, which use that data to coordinate pricing — there is no actual open turkey market because the production is contracted.

“A stable and affordable food supply is critical to our country’s well-being,” acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said May 8. “This Department of Justice is laser-focused on making everyday life affordable for all Americans.”

The Trump Administration had picked up the case from the Biden Administration as it tries to convince the public it is serious about rising food costs. Biden’s USDA, under the direction of Secretary Tom Vilsack, started an anti-trust team with the Justice Department that fell victim to Elon Musk’s chain saw. The administration is trying to put Humpty Dumpty back together while the meat industry writes another check: for child labor, for wage fixing in poultry, and for conspiracies in beef. It is a cost of doing business. After the check clears, Big Meat reverts to its normal position of fleecing the consumer and the farmer while exploiting the refugee.

Politicians have been talking since the days of the Bull Moose Party about anti-trust. That’s one thing. Now, we hear calls for a breakup. Senate Democrats in March trotted out a bill requiring big meat companies to pick their play: beef, pork or poultry but not all three like Tyson. That put the heat on Trump to go one better on anti-trust. He put his man Todd Blanche on the case. So far, Big Meat is doing a big shrug because they don’t believe Trump will actually pull the plug on them. Obama wouldn’t, so why would Taco Trump?

Tyson walked away from beef in Lexington, Neb., reportedly for lack of supply due to long-term drought. The town is left hanging. Cargill would do the same in Fort Morgan, if need be, or Tyson could dump Storm Lake if the turkeys take too much of the flu and leave that business to Hormel. We are about to leap into a $100 million water system expansion primarily because of pork and turkey processing. We could be left with a lot of expensive piping for nothing if Tyson doesn’t like our water rates. We’re a captive company town. We don’t even have a union to speak up for us.

How much of the load should we shoulder? We pay higher water rates for higher cancer rates. When you find the hogs are drinking the aquifers away, stop studying the aquifers and look the other way. When Saylorville Reservoir has toxic algae from manure, find another place to get your drinking water, Des Moines!

Attorney General Brenna Bird has not caught on. She flings lawsuits like cow chips but can’t find the chapter on protecting communities from corporate power. Her Democratic opponent, Nate Willems, is a labor lawyer who says we must be “cognizant” of this unbridled power over our lives.

Cognizant?

In the mid 1950s Iowa had 800 meat processors. Now we have about 80. Many of us can remember the independent farrow-to-finish pork producer, who left the scene in 1998 when Wall Street decided to consolidate pork as it had poultry. The Raccoon River once ran clean.

We should break it up and reclaim Iowa. Storm Lake has lived without meatpacking, but meatpacking cannot live without water. They own us. We give it away. Storm Lake made this the most profitable pork plant in the world. We should be rich. We will swallow a lot of crap if you pay us decent. Break them up. We will be better off.

Art Cullen is the editor of the Storm Lake Times Pilot in Northwest Iowa, where this column appeared. His latest book, Dear Marty, We Crapped In Our Nest: Notes from the Edge of the World, is available from Ice Cube Press. For more columns and editorials, please consider a subscription to the Times Pilot. Or, if you wish, you can make a tax-deductible gift to the Western Iowa Journalism Foundation to support independent community journalism in rural Iowa. Thanks.

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