SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (Dakota News Now\/Gray News) – South Dakota cattle producers are pushing back after President Donald Trump announced plans to make it easier for ranchers to process their own meat.<\/p>\n
In a Truth Social post on Friday, Trump called U.S. ranchers and farmers his \u201cnumber one priority\u201d and noted the difficulty he says they have with a small but major group of meat processors.<\/p>\n
Some producers say that consolidation has driven up prices. It\u2019s something both Trump and former President Joe Biden have tried to fix.<\/p>\n
But that\u2019s difficult because meat processing must meet strict safety requirements and undergo regular inspections, which raises the question of how exactly President Trump plans to allow more ranchers to process their own meat.<\/p>\n
The South Dakota Cattlemen\u2019s Association said ranchers can already process livestock for their own families, but cannot sell uninspected meat to stores and restaurants. The group argued federal meat inspection protects public health and consumer confidence in American beef.<\/p>\n
\u201cOne week ago, cattle producers united to oppose a vague policy announcement on imported beef. Today, President Trump issued another social media post announcing that soon farmers and ranchers will have a right to \u2018process their own food.\u2019 One action undercut American producers. The next could undermine consumer confidence,\u201d the association said in a statement. <\/p>\n
The association emphasized that it does not support weakening food safety standards, arguing, \u201cFood safety is NOT red tape. Consumer confidence is NOT optional.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAmerica established federal meat inspection more than a century ago because unsafe and unsanitary processing conditions threatened public health and trust. Following serious E. coli outbreaks in the 1990s, government and industry strengthened pathogen prevention and food safety controls. Those safeguards have been essential to rebuilding consumer confidence and protecting demand for American beef. Weakening them risks both public health and the market every cattle producer depends on,\u201d the association continued. <\/p>\n
The association called Trump\u2019s announcement \u201cnot a serious plan to strengthen America\u2019s beef supply chain,\u201d but rather \u201ca distraction from an import policy the cattle industry overwhelmingly rejected.\u201d<\/p>\n
The group is calling on the administration to withdraw the additional import allocation, preserve uniform inspection standards and work with the industry on solutions.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe urge producers to contact South Dakota\u2019s congressional delegation. Tell them to protect meat inspection standards and push back on the additional import allocation,\u201d the association added.<\/p>\n
Copyright 2026 Dakota News Now via Gray Local Media, Inc. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (Dakota News Now\/Gray News) – South Dakota cattle producers are pushing back after President Donald Trump announced plans to make it easier for ranchers to process their own meat. In a Truth Social post on Friday, Trump called U.S. ranchers and farmers his \u201cnumber one priority\u201d and noted the difficulty he says<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":61330,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[47],"tags":[6650,6648,6649,2694,5485,6382,6380,6378,6381,6379],"class_list":["post-61329","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-south-dakota","tag-beef","tag-cattle-ranchers","tag-meat-processing","tag-president-donald-trump","tag-ranchers","tag-south-dakota","tag-south-dakota-dining","tag-south-dakota-food","tag-south-dakota-grocery-stores","tag-south-dakota-restaurants"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/vive.im\/@dc\/117493605537828175","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61329","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=61329"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61329\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/61330"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=61329"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=61329"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diningandcooking.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=61329"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}