Mary Kay Thatcher’s Annual Meeting Address: What D.C. Politics Mean for Illinois Farmers

We may be thinking that the gridlock in Washington, DC is over, but Mary Kay Thatcher, federal government relations senior lead for Syngenta isn’t so sure. 

“If you look at the 2022 election and the 2024 election, Donald Trump might feel like he’s getting a mandate with republicans in control of all three branches, but if you really look, it isn’t a massive change,” she said. 

The recent election has the Senate at 53 Republicans and 47 Democrats versus the 2022 election with 49 Republicans and 51 Democrats. The Senate republicans can only lose three votes before they must rely on the other party to get a bill passed, and that’s a very thin margin. The House is similar. 

“This is the third congress in a row with single digit margins in the House. That hasn’t happened since 1795!” she said. “There’s a lot of people out there that say, ‘The gridlock has ended, the Republicans have a trifecta, we’re set to go.’ But I don’t think the gridlock has ended at all.”

Thatcher further illustrated her point with a reminder of the presidential nominations coming from those already elected to the House – Rep. Elisa Stefanik for the ambassador to the United Nations, Rep. Mike Waltz as national security adviser, and Rep. Matt Gaetz for attorney general. All three of these House seats will be replaced by new republican candidates, but running new elections takes time, leaving an even thinner margin for several months. Says Thatcher, “It’s going to be very difficult for Mike Johnson in the first three months of 2025.” 

Regarding the House Ag Committee, Thatcher shared an analysis of the top U.S. Congressional districts with the most farmers in their district according to the 2022 Ag Census. These top 110 Districts reflect 92 percent of the acres in the U.S. and have only three democrat elected officials in the entire group of 110. The point: democrats in the House Ag Committee are not always there to represent agricultural production, but to protect and enhance nutrition programs. 

Thatcher feels really good about Senator John Thune of South Dakota being named Majority Leader in the Senate and says that is among the biggest wins for agriculture. 

“He was asked seven questions at a recent event and on five of the seven questions, he brought up agriculture on his own. This tells you just how supportive he is about agriculture and how much he understands our issues,” she said. 

There is a little more concern over House and Senate Ag Committee leadership and how much Midwestern ag knowledge they will bring to the table. G.T. Thompson as Chairman of the House Ag Committee will reflect southern ag values, with John Boozman in the Senate doing the same. Ranking member David Scott expects a challenge in the House with Angie Craig and Jim Costa vying for that leadership position. Craig from Minnesota will likely understand midwestern agriculture better than Costa from California. Ranking member of the Senate Ag committee remains Amy Klobuchar from Minnesota, a positive for Midwestern farmers. 

And then the conversation turned to Presidential nominations. Says Thatcher, “My head is spinning at how fast the President-elect has made cabinet nominations. Look what he has accomplished in two weeks!” 

Most interesting, Thatcher explains that Senators will be seated on January 3 and the Presidential inauguration won’t take place until January 20; however, some of Trump’s key cabinet appointments like Marco Rubio and Scott Bessent could have time to be confirmed by the Senate by inauguration day, allowing President Trump to “hit the ground running” sooner with some of the really important nominations complete. 

The recent announcement of Brooke Rollins has Thatcher wondering. She said Washington, D.C. is a small family and she’s not yet met Rollins or even heard of her. She wasn’t ready to issue a judgment about if Rollins would be a positive or negative for Illinois corn farmers, but only hoped that the new Secretary of Ag would be able to withstand the requests from Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., nominee for Secretary of Health and Human Services, and protect and preserve agriculture’s most important programs and needs. Thatcher did think that Kennedy’s nomination could be a bigger worry for livestock producers who rely on the Food and Drug Administration for veterinary medicine approvals. 

What’s to come?

Thatcher believes there are only four things that can be tackled in the next four weeks, which includes only 12-14 session days between the U.S. House and the U.S. Senate. But she also relied on the historical fact that congressional action increases during a lame duck session, especially when the incoming administration is a different party than the outgoing administration. 

“We have to do something about the twelve appropriations bills that haven’t moved forward. I predict they will combine these somehow … and Speaker Johnson has said that the way forward will be whatever Trump wants,” she said. 

She believes that Majority Leader Senator Chuck Schumer will move to approve every judge possible in the next four weeks. And that national defense funding for 2025 will move because it is a must. 

She’s also betting on a weather disaster program, mostly for the hurricanes, fires, and droughts experienced in 2024. She forecasts that agriculture will get some allocations from this bill but cautions that they could hurt our chances for future farm bill allocations and the integrity of the crop insurance program. 

“We have succeeded in improving crop insurance because we said that a good crop insurance program means that we don’t need ad hoc disaster assistance, yet here we are asking for disaster assistance.” 

Thatcher – and the IL Corn Executive Director Rodney Weinzierl – both agree that there will be no farm bill in 2024 but are still hopeful for 2025. 

“This is my ninth farm bill,” she said. “No matter how hard we push each other – we aren’t supposed to write farm bills that reflect current economic conditions, because those conditions won’t continue for the next five years – but we do it anyway. The current economic situation will impact the 2025 farm bill.” 

Thatcher doesn’t look for a farm bill until at least June or July 2025. 

“Farmers might be expecting conservation and environmental regulations to lessen in the new administration, but Thatcher cautioned not to overlook the Endangered Species Act (ESA). “Please stay focused on the Endangered Species Act. It is a mind numbing issue because of the complexity and it’s easy to pass off, but this is a death by a thousand cuts,” she said. 

The EPA is likely to make a decision on the Monarch Butterfly and its ESA status on December 4.