Farm country has been waiting on a new farm bill for almost two years. Angie Craig, the top Democrat on the House Agriculture Committee and a Minnesota congresswoman now running for the state's open Senate seat, joins Heidi and Joel to talk about what's holding it up, what tariffs have cost rural families, and why farm bankruptcies are becoming as much a security question as an economic one.

Angie covers the imbalance that lets large agribusiness thrive while beginning farmers struggle to get a foothold, what immigration enforcement means for rural communities, and where she thinks the next farm bill needs to go if it's going to help anyone outside the biggest operations.

In this episode:

• The status of the farm bill and what it means for small and beginning farmers
• The impact of trade tariffs on U.S. agriculture
• Rising farm bankruptcies and farm suicides
• Rebuilding trust and economic resilience in rural communities
• Political dynamics in Congress between Republican and Democratic members
• Election timing and Minnesota's primary process
• ICE reform and immigration policy's effect on rural labor

Resources & Links:

Angie Craig Official Website

Connect with Angie Craig:

Instagram
Facebook
Twitter

Congresswoman Craig makes a solid case for where Washington has failed rural America, and where it goes from here.

The Hot Dish is brought to you by the One Country Project. To learn more, visit OneCountryProject.org, or find us on Substack (Onecountryproject.substack.com), and on YouTube, Bluesky, and Facebook (@onecountryproject).

• (00:00) - - Introduction: Craig's district and rural policy focus
• (00:34) - - Farm bill negotiations with Republicans
• (03:25) - - Family farmers and rising bankruptcies
• (05:40) - - Structuring a farm bill for small and beginning farmers
• (09:43) - - Tariffs, trade wars, and international markets
• (14:06) - - Policy decisions and rural mental health
• (16:02) - - Immigration enforcement and its effect on communities
• (18:22) - - Winning rural voters and rebuilding trust
• (24:06) - - Immigration reform: farm labor and DACA recipients
• (30:50) - - Bipartisanship and election timing
• (35:22) - - Craig's campaign goals and vision for Minnesota

Screw worms nearly disappeared from American ranches sixty years ago. Dr. Eric Deeble, executive director of Americans for the Common Good and former Deputy Under Secretary for Marketing and Regulatory Programs at USDA under the Biden Administration, has watched them find their way back, and he joins Heidi and Joel to explain what this parasitic fly means for livestock, trade, and the food supply.

Eric covers the biology behind the outbreak, how fast one infected animal can spread it, and why the fly is finding its way north again. He also gets into a newer technique for breeding sterile flies that could make eradication cheaper this time around.

In this episode:

• Why screw worms target living tissue and what that means for treatment
• How a sterile insect technique wiped out the fly from the U.S. the first time
• What let the fly move north again
• The economic risk ranchers face from one undetected outbreak
• How egg sexing could lower the cost of eradication

Resources & Links
Americans for the Common Good

Connect with Eric Deeble on:
LinkedIn

Sixty years of eradication work is unraveling. Eric explains what it'll take to fix that.

The Hot Dish is brought to you by the One Country Project. To learn more, visit OneCountryProject.org, or find us on Substack (Onecountryproject.substack.com), and on YouTube, Bluesky, and Facebook (@onecountryproject).

• (00:00) - - Why screw worm's return matters to agriculture
• (02:07) - - The fly's lifecycle and herd vulnerability
• (04:21) - - Myths versus reality on severity
• (05:43) - - Treatment and quarantine when detected
• (07:25) - - The cost of eradication and prevention
• (10:11) - - How reduced global cooperation risks a resurgence
• (13:22) - - Sterile insect technique: past success, recent setbacks
• (16:29) - - Climate and animal movement driving the spread north
• (18:38) - - Regional factors in where screw worm spreads
• (20:00) - - Funding cuts and the policy fight to maintain control
• (22:35) - - Consumer safety myths and real risks
• (24:16) - - Why continued investment in biosecurity matters
• (27:00) - - Final thoughts: vigilance, cooperation, funding

For America's 250th birthday, Heidi and Joel skip the fireworks and head for the ballpark, and they bring their guest, Bob Kendrick, along. He is the President of the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum in Kansas City, Missouri. The museum is just a few blocks away from where the team owners established a league of their own in 1920. Bob has spent three decades making sure that the players and the stories of the Negro League are not forgotten.

Bob walks Heidi and Joel through why some of the best baseball in the country got played on fields most fans never read about, how a club from Jamestown, North Dakota beat a lineup of big-league stars, and what happened to the Negro Leagues the day Jackie Robinson finally got his shot. Bob has answers and a lot of good stories to go with them.

In this episode:

• How Jim Crow forced Black players into their own leagues, and how they answered on the field
• Satchel Paige, Hank Aaron, Jackie Robinson, and careers the majors delayed or erased
• Why Negro Leagues games often outdrew the majors, and the talent gap that never existed
• Larry Doby and the different fight the American League's first Black player faced
• How World War II shifted the country's willingness to integrate its pastime

Resources & Links

Negro Leagues Baseball Museum

Connect with Bob Kendrick on:

Linkedin

Twitter

Two hundred fifty years in, America’s pastime still has a few chapters that are not told enough. Tune in.

The Hot Dish is brought to you by the One Country Project. To learn more, visit OneCountryProject.org, or find us on Substack (Onecountryproject.substack.com), and on YouTube, Bluesky, and Facebook (@onecountryproject).

• (00:00) - - Americana, baseball, and the show's focus
• (00:43) - - Kansas City, birthplace of the Negro Leagues
• (01:36) - - Bob Kendrick on the leagues' history
• (02:12) - - North Dakota's early integration
• (03:07) - - Bismarck and Jamestown's integrated teams
• (05:27) - - The Bismarck-Jamestown rivalry
• (07:03) - - Teaching the discrimination players faced
• (11:20) - - How long the leagues lasted after integration
• (12:30) - - Team geography and migration patterns
• (14:13) - - The East-West All-Star Game
• (17:10) - - Segregation's overt and covert forms
• (18:10) - - Satchel Paige's legend and skill
• (20:22) - - WWII, Willie Mays, and Henry Aaron
• (21:20) - - Jackie Robinson's courage and burden
• (24:13) - - Hank Aaron's rise to stardom
• (25:50) - - Baseball as a unifying force
• (32:00) - - The museum's future and mission
• (33:50) - - Positional barriers in early integration
• (38:01) - - Roy Campanella and other Hall of Famers who started in the leagues
• (43:27) - - Visit the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum