There are eight Democratic presidential candidates still in the race and it seems as if each candidate is taking turns making his or her own headlines every day.
However, former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s comments that sparked recent headlines were made over five years ago.
A video resurfaced from 2016 where Bloomberg said to the University of Oxford, “I could teach anybody, even people in this room so no offense intended, to be a farmer. It’s a process. You dig a hole, you put a seed in, you put dirt on top, add water, up comes the corn. You could learn that.”
As you can imagine, farmers on social media were outraged at his simplistic view of their profession. This attitude is one of the reasons why Hillary Clinton lost the 2016 presidential election.
However, the clip was edited to exclude the preface to his remarks on farming.
Bloomberg said, “If you think about the agrarian society (that) lasted 3,000 years, we could teach processes.”
After the backlash, Bloomberg’s senior adviser appeared on Fox News and said Bloomberg “was putting the comments about farmers in a historical context.”
The damage was already done, and the intent to rile up rural America was successful.
Though Bloomberg’s words were technically correct, you and I know farming is not that simple.
“Fox & Friends” jumped on Bloomberg’s remarks with a panel of farmers to react. Soybean grower Sid Rodgers said, “Well, I think it’s quite absurd considering the man probably couldn’t drop a quarter in a bubblegum machine and get something out—much less a seed core.”
South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem also said on Fox News, “I would challenge Mike Bloomberg to come spend a day with a farmer … to ride horses, rope steers, go out there and drive GPS-controlled tractors, computer program grain handling systems, and then internationally market your commodities to pay your bills and continue to do what they do best.”
So, what’s the advice to politicians, especially those from urban areas? If you must talk about farmers, watch your words and never simplify an entire profession, especially one that puts food on your silver spoon.
I am reminded of a leaked video in 2014 of former Congressman Bruce Braley, an Iowa Democrat, who was running for a U.S. Senate seat to replace Tom Harkin. To a group of lawyers, Braley said U.S. Senator Chuck Grassley, an Iowa Republican, was just “a farmer from Iowa who never went to law school.”
Though this flub was likely not the only thing that cost him a Senate seat, it certainly did not help. The seat went to Joni Ernst, who has made advocating for farmers one of her top priorities.
I don’t think Bloomberg’s words were all that damaging, and I hope he learned a lesson. I also have ideas on what Bloomberg can do after he digs that hole, but they are not fit to print.
Editor’s note: Seymour Klierly writes Washington Whispers for the Journal from inside the Beltway.
