Tribes hope Farm Bill can feed more people and preserve Indigenous culture

HOPKINTON, R.I. (AP) — At Ashawaug Farm in southwest Rhode Island, Dawn and Cassius Spears preserve their Indigenous knowledge of agriculture through the cultivation and keeping of three Narragansett heritage crops: white corn, succotash beans and crookneck squash.

They would like to expand their farm's reach beyond their farm stand, but it's challenging. Like many small food producers, the Spears have sought financial assistance through federal programs. Some have been cut or significantly scaled back under the Trump Administration, including U.S. Department of Agriculture programs that helped tribal farmers.

Tribes relied on these programs to grow and distribute culturally-significant foods locally.

“When we go into these federal programs, we’re hoping that they’ll last long enough,” Cassius Spears said. “They usually start out with a good song and dance. And they’re going to last a long time. And then something happens where they get cut.”

The Biden administration started two programs during the pandemic to help states and tribes purchase local food from nearby farmers for food banks and schools: the Local Food Purchase Assistance Cooperative Agreement Program (LFPA) and the Local Food for Schools Cooperative Agreement Program (LFS). These programs offered farmers, including tribal farmers, reliable markets for their products. Tribal governments received assistance to purchase food from local producers to distribute to tribal members.

This allowed tribes to get federal dollars directly to small-scale producers, said Carly Griffith Hotvedt, executive director of the Indigenous Food and Agriculture Initiative and a member of Cherokee Nation. The Spears' farm provided food for a tribal farm in nearby Connecticut that used LFPA funds, after an agreement was signed in August 2022.

In some instances, tribes used those dollars to source culturally-significant foods for tribal members such as bison meat, certain types of berries and wild rice that were included as part of a food box distribution. For some low-income tribal members, it was the best way to access these types of foods, Hotvedt said.

“It wasn’t just commodity foods in that box. It was highly local, traditionally relevant, culturally relevant foods that were included,” Hotvedt said.

In March 2025, under the Trump administration, the Agriculture Department ended the two programs that provided more than $1 billion for schools and food banks, saying that they no longer aligned with the agency's goals.

U.S. Sen. Jack Reed, a Rhode Island Democrat, and Sen. Jim Justice, a West Virginia Republican, introduced a bill they say takes the best from the two programs and creates a permanent grant program. It would allow state and tribal governments to buy local foods from local and regional producers to distribute to nearby hunger relief programs and schools.

Reed said he feared that when the USDA programs were cut, families across the country would have a more difficult time getting access to food. And, he said, the access wouldn't be to nutritious, freshly grown produce.

Reed said he’s hoping to get the legislation passed as part of the Farm Bill, the massive, multi-year law that governs agricultural and food programs. The House passed its version of the bill in April, and a Senate committee released its draft in late June. The House version also includes a bipartisan proposal for a permanent program modeled after the Local Food Purchase Assistance program. It would allow states, through the USDA, to establish cooperative agreements connecting local farmers and producers with local food distribution organizations.

Both proposals would set aside 10% of the program’s funding for tribes.

For a new program to succeed, Congress must include mandatory funding in order to help farmers better plan, purchase supplies and hire staff because they know they’re going to sell products through those programs, said Hannah Quigley, a policy specialist with the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition. The House version would require Congress to agree on funding annually, she added.

Reed said he's advocating for mandatory funding in the Senate because without it very little is funded these days, and because farms are under so much pressure economically. An optional program wouldn't help them as much, he said.

“We really want to punch through the existing obstacles for small farmers and Native American farmers,” he said.

Dawn and Cassius Spears would like to see Indigenous producers prioritized when tribal entities purchase food. And they said they think having dedicated programs that Indigenous producers can access outside of their tribal government would help more Indigenous producers.

Under the canopy of one of her farm’s high tunnels at the start of this year's planting season, Dawn Spears carefully organized her tomato crop, separating the tiny plants before moving them to a field outside. The name of the 6-acre farm is an homage to the Narragansett name of the river that flows through town. It started as a small community garden and food sovereignty project.

One of her grandsons, 9-year-old Giizhig, walked in to ask if she needed help.

“Only if you want to,” Spears replied. “It’s always good to know how to do it, right?”

Teaching the next generation about where food comes from and how to grow responsibly is key for her. But her culture isn’t just about cultivating crops. It’s also about gathering foods they eat from the wild and being able to preserve and access land where those foods are.

She's working to protect the land around their farm as development grows with the hope of introducing native plants into that area that can be foraged for food. Federal funding programs can also help with securing access to land, she said.

“If you take a person away from the land that they come from, then it’s like they’re not whole,” she said. “We have to eat the food that’s naturally from that space that we come from.”

McDermott reported from Providence, Rhode Island.

Follow Joshua A. Bickel on Instagram, Bluesky and X @joshuabickel.

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Dawn Spears checks on her garden beds Tuesday, April 21, 2026, at her farm in Hopkinton, R.I. (AP Photo/Joshua A. Bickel)

Sowaniu Spears, from left, Tishominko Spears, Quinobeguin Spears Fulton and Giizhig Spears, play at their grandparents' farm Tuesday, April 21, 2026, in Hopkinton, R.I. (AP Photo/Joshua A. Bickel)

Comfry, a plant used in herbal remedies, grows Tuesday, April 21, 2026, at a farm in Hopkinton, R.I. (AP Photo/Joshua A. Bickel)

Dawn Spears loads a cart full of tomato plants Tuesday, April 21, 2026, at her farm in Hopkinton, R.I. (AP Photo/Joshua A. Bickel)

Quinobeguin Spears Fulton, 11, climbs a tree Tuesday, April 21, 2026, at his grandparents' farm in Hopkinton, R.I. (AP Photo/Joshua A. Bickel)

Sowaniu Spears, 11, enters a Wetu, a traditional Native American dwelling, Tuesday, April 21, 2026, at his grandparents' farm in Hopkinton, R.I. (AP Photo/Joshua A. Bickel)

Sowaniu Spears, 11, runs toward a Wetu, a traditional Native American dwelling, Tuesday, April 21, 2026, at his grandparents' farm in Hopkinton, R.I. (AP Photo/Joshua A. Bickel)

Sowaniu Spears, 11, holds a bundle of Narragansett white flint corn Tuesday, April 21, 2026, at his grandparents' farm in Hopkinton, R.I. (AP Photo/Joshua A. Bickel)

Seeds sit in jars on a shelf Tuesday, April 21, 2026, at a farm in Hopkinton, R.I. (AP Photo/Joshua A. Bickel)

Dawn Spears, center, reacts after finding a small trowel that her grandson, Giizhig, 9, left, was looking for as they prepare tomato plants Tuesday, April 21, 2026, at a farm in Hopkinton, R.I. (AP Photo/Joshua A. Bickel)

Dawn Spears wears a beaded earring resembling a strawberry Tuesday, April 21, 2026, at her farm in Hopkinton, R.I. (AP Photo/Joshua A. Bickel)

Dawn Spears holds heirloom seeds including, from left, Narragansett white flint corn, crookneck squash and succotash beans Tuesday, April 21, 2026, in Hopkinton, R.I. (AP Photo/Joshua A. Bickel)

Dawn Spears, left, and her grandson, Giizhig, 9, right, prepare tomatoes for planting Tuesday, April 21, 2026, at a farm in Hopkinton, R.I. (AP Photo/Joshua A. Bickel)

The Trump administration’s online accounts are circulating images of a pumpkin carved with a sombrero design and a fake Halloween-themed background around a Black man apparently accused of food assistance fraud, in social media posts slammed by critics as inflammatory rhetoric.

Only days before the midterm elections, the posts coincide with the government’s sweeping campaign to show its aggressive immigration enforcement, and highlight efforts to crack down on fraud to save taxpayers money when rising healthcare costs and other economic stressors have made affordability a top voter concern.

Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins posted Saturday on the social platform X a photo of the Black man standing in front of stacks of what appear to be U.S. currency with the headline, SNAP FRAUDSTER, an apparent reference to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, formerly known as food stamps.

He is holding aloft what appears to be a bill set aflame.

“Some costumes come with a price tag. This one comes with a prison sentence,” it says to the backdrop of fake Spirit Halloween costume packaging.

Another photo posted by the White House on X on Thursday showed a pumpkin with the shape of a sombrero carved across it and the words “Spooky szn is here.”

The post by Rollins, who was nominated by Trump to serve as the U.S. Secretary of Agriculture in November 2024, appears to be taken from an Instagram post from September 2025 by an account under the name Shawty Dred.

Earlier this month, Mercedes Reshard New, identified by the Justice Department as a social media personality also known as “Shawty Dred,” was arrested on federal charges for fraudulently obtaining more than $4 million in Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits in Georgia.

It’s not the first time the White House has been accused of posting inflammatory images on official government social media accounts.

Just over a year ago during the government shutdown, the White House revived a deepfake video posted by Trump of House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries in a fake mustache and sombrero to accuse the Democrats of acting on behalf of illegal immigrants instead of U.S. citizens. Jeffries described the meme as bigoted. They played it on repeat in the White House briefing room, though Vice President JD Vance promised that the “sombrero memes will stop” when Democrats agreed to end the shutdown.

The NAACP did not respond to an email seeking comment, nor did the White House or Rollins.

The Trump administration in recent weeks has ratcheted up its anti-immigrant rhetoric and accusations of fraud, including against U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar whose Washington, D.C., home was searched by federal agents earlier this month. Federal authorities are investigating potential fraud in her family’s immigration paperwork. Omar, who was born in Somalia, is a naturalized U.S. citizen.

It also has taken a series of punitive steps linked to allegations of fraud in mostly Democratic-led states, including California and Minnesota whose governors accused the federal government of targeting their states for political reasons.

Federal prosecutors said in a news release Oct. 21 that the influencer, New, controlled more than 350 fraudulent SNAP accounts under stolen identities between January 2020 and July 2026. He allegedly applied for his company, Shawty Dred LLC, to become an authorized SNAP retailer and used EBT debit cards to extract about $4 million from the accounts.

New’s Instagram account, which has more than two million followers, has flaunted his extravagant lifestyle, federal prosecutors said. Posts depict him flying on private jets, posing with Rolls-Royce vehicles in front of his “super mansion,” and handling massive stacks of cash.

“Instead of this money feeding families in need, New, the social media personality known as ‘Shawty Dred,’ allegedly used the cash to bankroll a life of luxury,” Special Agent in Charge of FBI Atlanta Marlo Graham said in the release.

New was indicted by a federal grand jury Oct. 7 on dozens of counts of mail fraud and aggravated identity theft, and one count each of SNAP fraud and illegal transactions with access devices. He was arrested Oct. 13 and remains in federal custody.

According to Fulton County jail records, New has been arrested multiple times on suspicion of crimes including identity theft, insurance fraud, financial transaction card fraud, forgery and simple assault.

A federal defender listed in court records as representing New, Joseph Austin, did not return a phone message.

FILE - Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins speaks with reporters at the White House, Aug. 25, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, File)