June 26, 2020 — President Trump ordered the Department of Agriculture to offer a lifeline to the struggling Maine lobster industry that has been hit hard by his trade policies with China.
Trump’s trade war with China devastated farmers in the Midwest, but it also evaporated Maine’s chief export market as escalating tariffs led China to place a 35 percent markup on lobster.
The late Wednesday order from Trump all but directs the Agriculture Department to extend a $30 billion farm bailout program to Maine’s commercial fishers. The program previously sent cash to corn, soybean, pig and other farmers, primarily in the Midwest, who Trump has courted in his reelection effort.
The move follows years of lobbying by Maine’s congressional delegation, which cited “severe financial difficulties due to unfair retaliatory tariffs” in a joint statement expressing support for the government aid.
“Better late than never,” Sen. Angus King (I-Maine) tweeted.
“We made it clear last year in a letter comparing our lobster industry to the farmers in the Midwest seeing relief in this tariff fallout. The first line was ‘Why not lobsters?’” King added in a statement to The Hill, noting that lobsters were one of the first items hit with Chinese tariffs.