There won’t be any trade relief payments for farmers with unplanted crops. Politico quotes an unnamed official as saying USDA has made the determination. However, a department spokesman did not confirm or deny that a decision had been made either way. Last month, the department said it would pay up to $14.5 billion directly to producers who’ve been hit hard by President Donald Trump’s trade war.

The payment rate would be determined partly by the total amount of a farm’s planted acres. Growers who didn’t get a crop in the ground wouldn’t be eligible for the help. Ag economists raised concerns that producers might plant crops just to try and collect some trade aid help when they otherwise wouldn’t put a crop in the ground. Ag Secretary Sonny Perdue said USDA was looking at whether or not they could legally offer trade aid for unplanted acres, noting that, “You have to have something to sell or trade for a tariff impact.”

However, farm groups made the case that trade tension can affect producers’ crop insurance coverage when they can’t plant due to the weather. Those revenue guarantees are based in part on commodity prices, which have dropped because of retaliatory tariffs. Politico says not offering trade aid on unplanted acres would bring USDA right back to where it started on the issue.

Mexico released a list of U.S. products that could face a retaliatory tariff in response to possible Trump Administration tariffs that are scheduled to start this Monday on Mexican imports. A Reuters report says the focus appears to be on states that supported Trump’s bid for the presidency. However, the list doesn’t include corn, one of Mexico’s biggest imports.

Mexico’s rapidly-growing livestock industry relies on millions of tons of U.S.-grown yellow corn annually. Industry experts say it would be extremely difficult for Mexico to replace American corn with imports from other countries quickly enough to fill the gap. President Trump has said he’ll apply the first round of tariffs on all Mexican imports starting next week if Mexico doesn’t take steps to help stop the flow of Central American immigrants seeking entry into the United States.

Four anonymous Mexican government officials told Reuters that the list was prepared by the economy ministry and is sitting in President Lopez Obrador’s office. Mexico’s retaliatory tariffs focus on states that voted for Trump in 2016, where agriculture plays a major role in the economy. The tariffs are also targeted at several industrial states like Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Ohio.

WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. and Mexican officials claim to be making progress as they labored for a second day to avert import tariffs. But President Donald Trump is still threatening to impose them as he tries to pressure Mexico into stemming the flow of Central American migrantsacross the United States’ southern border.

Vice President Mike Pence, monitoring the talks from his travels in Pennsylvania, said Thursday the U.S. was “encouraged” by Mexico’s latest proposals but that tariffs still were set to take effect on Monday.

Pence added that it would be “for the president to decide” whether Mexico was doing enough to head off the tariffs. Pence said that, among other issues, negotiators had been discussing a potential agreement to make it difficult for those who enter Mexico from other countries to claim asylum in the U.S. Mexico has long resisted that request.

Trump has threatened to impose a 5% tax on all Mexican goods beginning Monday as part of an escalating tariff regime opposed by many in his own Republican Party.

The frantic, last-minute talks underscore Trump’s chaotic approach even when decisions have enormous economic consequences for both the U.S. and its closest allies. Trump has embraced tariffs as a tool he can use as leverage against other countries, dismissing the potential harm to American consumers and manufacturers.

Traveling in Europe, Trump told reporters that negotiators had made “a lot of progress,” but continued to play coy.

“We’ll see what happens,” Trump said in Ireland before leaving for France to attend a D-Day ceremony. “But something pretty dramatic could happen. We’ve told Mexico the tariffs go on. And I mean it, too. And I’m very happy with it.”

It remained unclear whether any deal could be struck with Trump out of the country. Many in Washington still expect the tariffs to go into effect barring a major new concession from Mexico, though lawmakers who have been in talks with both U.S. and Mexican officials said they were hopeful a deal could be reached to satisfy Trump, or at least delay the tariffs’ implementation.

Mexican Foreign Secretary Marcelo Ebrard spent several hours at the State Department Thursday morning, while Trump’s legal counsel and other Mexican aides met at the White House Thursday afternoon.

Ebrard told reporters as he left the State Department that progress was being made and that he was likely to return following consultations at the embassy. He returned in early evening.

His spokesman, Roberto Velasco, tweeted that “Options continue to be explored.”

“The stance of the United States is focused on measures of migratory control, ours on development,” he said.

White House spokeswoman Mercedes Schlapp said in an interview that conversations were continuing but “it looks like we’re moving toward this path of tariffs because what we’ve seen so far is that the Mexicans, what they’re proposing, is simply not enough.”

Pence, who led the discussions Wednesday with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and other U.S. officials, told reporters in Pennsylvania that the administration had “made it very clear that our neighbors to the south, Mexico, must do more to end the tide of illegal immigration that is besetting our southern border.”

During Wednesday’s talks, the gulf between the countries was clear as Mexico offered small, thus far undisclosed concessions, and the U.S. demanded major action. A senior administration official said the U.S. once again pressed Mexico to step up enforcement on its southern border and to enter into a “safe third country agreement” that would make it difficult for those who enter Mexico from other countries to claim asylum in the U.S.

But Mexico surprised U.S. officials Thursday when they returned to the negotiating table and said they would commit to what Pence had requested, according to the official, who cautioned that significant questions about timing and implementation remain.

Trump officials have said Mexico can prevent the tariffs by securing its southern border with Guatemala, cracking down on criminal smuggling organizations and overhauling its asylum system. But the U.S. has not proposed concrete metrics to assess whether Mexico is complying, and it is unclear whether even those steps would be enough to satisfy Trump on illegal immigration, a signature issue of his presidency and one that he sees as crucial to his 2020 re-election campaign.

Beyond Trump and several White House advisers, few in the administration believe imposing tariffs is a good idea, according to officials familiar with internal deliberations. Those people worry about the negative economic consequences for Americans and believe the tariffs — which would likely spark retaliatory taxes on U.S. exports — would also hurt the administration politically. The officials were not authorized to discuss the matter publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.

Republicans in Congress have warned the White House that they are ready to stand up to the president to try to block his tariffs, which they worry would spike costs to U.S. consumers, harm the economy and imperil a major pending U.S.-Mexico-Canada trade deal .

Democratic House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Richard Neal said he will introduce a resolution of disapproval to stop the tariffs if Trump goes through with his threat, panning it as presidential “overreach.”

The Department of Homeland Security announced Wednesday that U.S. Border Patrol apprehensions of migrants illegally crossing the border hit the highest level in more than a decade in May: 132,887 apprehensions, including a record 84,542 adults and children traveling together and 11,507 children traveling alone.

Two Midwestern lawmakers are calling on the Department of Agriculture to enact payment limits through farm programs. Senate Republican Chuck Grassley of Iowa along with and Representative Jeff Fortenberry of Nebraska penned a letter to Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue, urging him “use his existing regulatory authority” in order to ensure that individuals receiving farm payments are actively engaged in farming.

The letter states the farm safety net “was never intended to maximize government payments.” The letter calls for “an effective payment limit system,” one in which each farm is subject to the same limitation. Grassley has been a vocal advocate for farm payment limitations. A Grassley amendment to close a loophole allowing an unlimited number of so-called managers to qualify for federal subsidies was included in the last two farm bills.

In both of the last two farm bill negotiations, Grassley’s amendment was removed from the final bill. Before the last farm bill, the Government Accountability Office documented that at least $259 million was paid out through the actively engaged loophole Grassley’s amendment sought to close.

The House Appropriations Committee 2020 Agriculture spending bill rejects many of the cuts proposed by President Trump. Representative Nita Lowey, a New York Democrat who chairs the full Appropriations Committee, says the bill “rejects the President’s misguided budget and instead invests in important initiatives for the people.”

Subcommittee Chair Sanford Bishop, a Democrat from Georgia, says the bill “invests in America’s fundamental needs and rejects the Administration’s radical cuts.” The bill allocates $24 billion, four percent above the fiscal year 2019 enacted level, and more than $5.1 billion above the budget request. The bill provides nearly $4 billion for rural development, $1.8 billion in farm programs, $3.3 billion for agricultural research, and fully funds the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.

For the Food and Drug Administration, the bill provides $3.2 billion in discretionary funding, which is $185 million above fiscal year 2019. The bill reported out of committee in a vote of 29 to 21 and now awaits further consideration by the full U.S. House of Representatives.

A House subcommittee hearing on the relocation proposals for two Department of Agriculture agencies highlights further contention regarding the move. USDA has proposed relocating the Economic Research Service and the National Institute of Food and Agriculture to one of the following areas, the Kansas City metro, Indiana, or to Research Triangle Park in Raleigh, North Carolina.

Subcommittee chair Stacey Plaskett, a Democrat from the U.S. Virgin Islands, opened the hearing stating the proposal will “undermine the integrity of these agencies and their ability to operate.” The National Farmers Union contends the proposal is already damaging the industry, as experienced researchers scramble to find new jobs, alleging that NIFA and ERS have both “lost decades of institutional knowledge.”

However, the top Republican on the House Agriculture Committee, Mike Conaway, states, “There is nothing that prevents USDA’s mission from extending outside of the beltway.” Conaway adds, “The elitist notion that all wisdom and knowledge stems from Washington, D.C. is offensive to me and should be offensive to anyone who resides in rural America.” Conaway called the hearing a distraction that fails to focus on the pressing issues facing agriculture today, such as farm income, weather and trade.