For Leadership on Family Farm Agriculture, Montana Farmers Union Honors Tester with Golden Triangle Award

Presents highest legislative honor, talks tariffs, farm consolidation with Senator

U.S. Senator Jon Tester today was honored by the Montana Farmers Union for his leadership on issues facing family farmers in rural America. The group presented Tester, the Senate’s only working farmer, with its Golden Triangle Award – their highest legislative honor.

“It’s a great honor to represent Montana’s farmers and ranchers in the Senate,” Tester said. “But right now, family farm agriculture is hurting. We have to do more to protect farmers and ranchers, and keep rural America strong. This award is a reminder of why I fight every day to make sure working families and agriculture – our state’s number one industry – aren’t left behind.”

After the award presentation, Tester and representatives from the MFU discussed President Trump’s escalating trade war with China, and the impacts of tariffs on family farm agriculture.

The uncertainty and retaliatory tariffs caused by the trade war have been disastrous for Montana farmers, on top of a hike in tariffs on $75 billion worth of American goods from 5 to 10 percent. The Administration has been forced to spend more than $28 billion taxpayer dollars to help farmers suffering from the effects of the trade war so far, while economic data increasingly shows significant damage being dealt to the American economy.

The group also discussed Tester’s efforts to limit consolidation in agriculture and protect competition in the ag marketplace. Tester’s Food and Agribusiness Merger Moratorium and Antitrust Review Act would enact a moratorium on mergers and acquisitions by agriculture businesses, and reverse the cycle of consolidation that is killing small towns in Montana and across the country. The moratorium would be in place until Congress passes comprehensive legislation addressing market consolidation for both input and output agriculture markets.

A third generation farmer, Tester still farms the same land homesteaded by his family in Big Sandy.