A North Carolina beekeeper who cast his vote for Donald Trump on three separate occasions has acknowledged that he has experienced significant financial losses as a consequence of the President’s policies.
Jim Hartman, who runs honey farm Secret Garden Bees in Linden, said the impact of tariffs and federal cuts has cut his annual revenue in half.
‘I never thought I was going to lose this much money this fast,’ Hartman told CNN.
Although Trump has put larger levies on hold for now, a 10 percent baseline tariff on goods from 60 countries is still in place.
Hartman imports packaging supplies from various different countries so is keeping a close eye on where tariff negotiations go.
‘We just recently purchased our annual supply of bottles from Taiwan and corks from Portugal about three weeks ago,’ he revealed. ‘So that would have amounted to an additional five or six thousand dollars from my own pocket.’
Hartman, a Republican, used to sell honey to the federal government, which would then provide it to schools and food banks.
Under Trump’s sweeping budget cuts, this program was suddenly axed.
Jim Hartman, who runs honey farm Secret Garden Bees in Linden, said the impact of tariffs and federal cuts has cut his annual revenue in half
‘For a lot of other local farmers around here it was a major source of reliable revenue,’ Hartman said of the program.
‘For me it’s going to cost me around $150,000 a year. Roughly 50 percent of my revenue. It’s a massive hit.’
He added that he will not be hiring any new workers on the farm, and will be repairing his 40-year-old forklift instead of replacing it.
Buying anything like that would be prohibitive, he said, as the cost of equipment has gone ‘through the roof.’
Hartman has voted for Trump three times over the years, but admitted perhaps he ‘should have considered some other options’ in the last election.
Despite the President’s announcement of a 90-day postponement on tariffs for countries that had not enforced reciprocal duties, Hartman remains skeptical that the challenges have completely subsided.
‘It’s flip flopped so many times you can’t take it to the bank,’ he told the outlet.
‘Who knows what it will be next week. It seems like he’s heard the American people.’
Jim Hartman, a North Carolina beekeeper who makes raw honey, said it’s not just the tariffs that have him fretting about the future. Hartman said he lost a $150,000 contract with the federal government, which would in turn provide the raw honey to schools and food banks
Hartman used to sell honey to the federal government, which would then provide it to schools and food banks
On Tuesday, Trump took to his social media platform Truth Social, pledging to ‘protect’ American farmers
Farmers are a group that has traditionally been seen as some of Trump’s most loyal constituencies.
Earlier this month, a lifelong cotton farmer in Moulton, Alabama, told the Daily Mail that he is pro-tariffs.
Mark Yeager said he had witness firsthand the devastating impacts that celebrated international trade deals and globalization have had on his community.
On Tuesday, Trump took to his social media platform Truth Social, pledging to ‘protect’ American farmers.
He admitted that farmers can find themselves in the firing line when it comes to international trade negotiations.
‘Our farmers are GREAT, but because of their GREATNESS, they are always put on the Front Line with our adversaries, such as China, whenever there is a Trade negotiation or, in this case, a Trade War,’ he wrote.
Not only do tariffs increase the cost of supplies and equipment for farmers, but they raise the risk of retaliation against exports of crops grown in the US.
Currently, the US has imposed a 145 percent tariff on Chinese goods. China has retaliated with a 125 percent levy on imports from the US.
The White House has said it is weighing up how it can help farmers, pointing out that the first Trump administration spent $28 billion bailing out farmers hurt by tariffs.
But this time, the tariffs are much higher.
‘The same thing happened in my First Term,’ Trump wrote on Truth Social.
‘China was brutal to our Farmers, I [told] these Patriots to just hold on, and a great trade deal was made. I rewarded our farmers with a payment of $28 Billion Dollars, all through the China deal.
‘It was a great transaction for the USA, until Crooked Joe Biden came in and didn’t enforce it.’
