Farmer Cris Peterson spoke on the second night of the Republican National Convention on Aug. 25, 2020.
Transcript
Good evening, my name is Chris Petersen. My husband Gary, our family, and I, milk a thousand cows on a dairy farm in Grantsburg Wisconsin, a small middle American Town. Truth be told, until I married my cute farmer from Grantsburg, a long time ago, I was a city slicker from Minneapolis, which is about 70 miles south of us. Donald Trump became president in the middle of the great depression for dairy farmers. In Wisconsin in 2016 prices were horrible and longtime generational farms across the nation we’re going out of business. In 2017our hundred and twenty year old barn, which served as our milking center, caught fire and burned to the ground. Our cows were spared but, because they needed to be milked three times a day, farmers, friends and complete strangers from all over Northern Wisconsin helped haul them to other farms where they stayed until we could rebuild. By the end of 2018 we had a new state-of-the-art robotic milking facility that allows our cows to milk themselves three times a day. At about the same time, President Trump’s economic boom began helping dairy farmers across the nation. As a businessman, President Trump understands that farming is a complicated capital-intensive and risky business. More than any president in my lifetime, he’s acknowledged the importance of farmers and agriculture. That’s supported and focus on negotiating new trade deals gave us the confidence to rebuild our barn and dairy operation. Business was booming again and business boomed right until the covid-19 shutdown in March. Many people probably don’t realize that our country is one of the few in the world that produces nearly all of its own food. Fewer still understand, and to step close our food production and distribution system came to collapsing this past spring. But President Trump understood and again took steps to provide the supports we needed. President Trump took the necessary action knowing that agriculture is our backbone and strength, critical to our national security. Our entire economy and dairy farming are once again roaring back. One person deserves the credit and our vote, President Donald J. Trump.
