HURON — With commodity prices continuing to drop and with the harvest not far off, “producers are really nervous” about the lack of a fair trade deal, Sen. Mike Rounds, R-S.D., said Thursday.
While they want President Trump to be successful in negotiating a better agreement, they can’t wait much longer, he said in a conference call with reporters.
Does he have any assurance a resolution will come in the near term?
“We don’t, that’s the problem,” Rounds said.
In a letter to the president on Wednesday, South Dakota’s delegation urged him to make U.S. agriculture exports a priority with trading partners.
Market uncertainty has already cost South Dakota producers hundreds of millions of dollars, with the ripple effect to be felt across the state.
Rounds said there are fears of economic collapse not only among farmers and ranchers but in rural communities as well.
Soybeans, for example, have declined $2.17 per bushel since March 1.
“They (producers) hope the administration understands how significant the impact is on real lives of people trying to make a living in the Upper Midwest,” Rounds said.

While Trump’s tax cut and elimination of burdensome federal regulations have been hailed as good moves, they want him to know the tactics on trade are not working here, he said.
The agriculture economy has been hurting for the last five years, with farm income down 50 percent, he said.
Increasing tariffs and the retaliation that has followed from other countries has had a dramatic effect on the value of soybeans, Rounds said.
In their letter, Sen. John Thune, R-S.D.; Rep. Kristi Noem, R-S.D.; and Rounds said while they support efforts to address a broad spectrum of trade inequities, “we do not support, however, making agriculture exports, which have been the exception to such trade inequities, bear the brunt of retaliatory actions in response to current U.S. trade policies.”
Meanwhile, Rounds said he was at the White House Monday evening as the president announced his nominee to fill an upcoming vacancy on the Supreme Court to a national audience.
A federal appellate judge in the District of Columbia, Brett Kavanaugh would replace retiring Justice Anthony Kennedy if confirmed by the Senate.
Asked if he had received much comment on the selection yet from South Dakotans, Rounds said “not a lot.
“We haven’t had a lot of contact with a lot of different folks across the state of South Dakota; I suspect that we will,” he said.
But he said there is already an organized effort across the country to lobby senators through emailed form letters.  
Rounds expects to hear from more people back home when the start of the televised confirmation hearing gets closer.
First, though, the committee will be reviewing all of Kavanaugh’s judicial writings, including the 300 written decisions he has made as an appellate judge, which Rounds calls a window into his thought process and reasoning.
“This is a whole host of information they can use to gather data,” he said.
On a dozen different occasions, Supreme Court justices have used Kavanaugh’s own language to explain their opinions.
“That’s a pretty positive thing when you think about it,” Rounds said.
He said Kavanaugh is an excellent choice for the high court, because he has said his role as a judge is to interpret the law rather than create it.
“That’s what conservatives wanted to hear,” Rounds said. “But you still do your due diligence.”