The Trump administration should take steps to ease mounting fears of trade retaliation against U.S. agricultural exports and work to seal deals quickly, farm state lawmakers say, as the European Union steps up its preparations for tariff retaliation.

“Those concerns about retaliation are pretty big in farm country,” Sen. Mike Rounds, R-S.D., told Agri-Pulse this week. “Anything we can do right now to allay those suspicions would be very helpful.”

The European Commission last week presented retaliation proposals to member states. Once approved, the package could be ready as soon as Aug. 1 if the two sides don’t reach a deal. It would hit more than $7 billion in U.S. agricultural products with tariff hikes.

Senate appropriators are also wary. In a report on the FY26 Departments of Commerce and Justice, Science and Related Agencies Appropriations Bill filed last week, the panel urged the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative and Commerce Department to "fully evaluate and consider" tariff retaliation in trade policymaking. 

Rounds said he raised the prospect of tariff retaliation assistance for farmers in a meeting with Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins last week and that the administration has “recognized that this is a possibility.”

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Sen. James Lankford, R-Okla., said he’s not worried about European retaliation, but he is hoping for a swift resolution to the tariff standoff.

“You want to see your markets that are out there, but you're competing for ag relationships,” Lankford said. “The sooner you can get to those deals, the better, because you’ve got to work out all the logistics.”

But senators emphasized that there is still plenty of support in farm country for the president’s trade approach.

Farmers and ranchers “do believe that the president is moving in the right direction,” Rounds said.

“I'm glad Donald Trump is standing up to [the EU],” Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Kan., said. He downplayed retaliation fears, saying that the bloc is “not a significant export market for U.S. agriculture.”

“The EU has never treated us fairly,” Marshall added. “They need to come around.”

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