US war on farming accelerates: Idaho farmers sound alarm over water restrictions that will damage 500K acres of farmland

Alicia Warren
FOX Business
Tue, 18 Jun 2024 15:31 UTC

© Adam Young

The wheat harvest takes place on the Youngs’ farm in Bingham County Idaho. Farmer Adam Young said he is subject to a water curtailment order issued by the Idaho Department of Water Resources on May 27

Eastern Idaho farmers may soon be out of water after the state issued a major curtailment.

Brian Murdock, a farmer who resides in East Idaho, warned of the potential devastating impact of the order on his business during his appearance on "The Bottom Line" Wednesday.

"Well, as you said, the state of Idaho and the Idaho Department of Water Resources has issued this curtailment of 500,000 acres. And to help put that in perspective, that's basically 781 square miles of farm ground that is being taken out of production," Murdock stressed.

"And, of course, the worst problem is this is happening during a very plentiful water year. We have the reservoirs [that] are completely full, and when I mean full, they're dang near breaking. The rivers are running as high as they possibly can. Just trying to keep those dams from breaking," he added.

The Idaho Groundwater Appropriators, which represents agricultural, industrial and municipal ground water users across southeastern Idaho, described the order as the single largest curtailment of water use in state history. It would result in the drying up of hundreds of thousands of acres of farmland and could cost the state hundreds of millions of dollars in economic losses.

Murdock continued his family's 135-year-old legacy of growing potatoes and is facing a $3 million loss due to the state-issued order.

Comment: At some point the losses mount up and farmers simply shut up shop for good. Especially when draconian moves such as this set the precedent that they can happen again, at anytime and for any reason.

FOX Business' Grady Trimble reports from Iowa, where the economy and Biden's climate agenda are top issues on farmers' and voters' minds.

"I'm one of the smaller farms. But, let me tell you the impact as a potato grower. I grow 23 million large orders of McDonald's French fries and of the grain side of my operation, I grow 16 million loaves of bread," he explained.

Murdock told co-hosts Dagen McDowell and Sean Duffy that he amounts to less than one percent of what the curtailment is about. However, due to the issues surrounding farm ground and security, it is a "significant amount."

In a press release issued last week, Gov. Brad Little said: "What people cannot see, especially in a 'good' water year, is what's underground - the ongoing dwindling supply of water in the Eastern Snake Plain Aquifer. Water from the aquifer feeds the Snake River. Like we do as Idahoans, we are coming together and building some momentum around efforts to get ground water users in compliance with an approved mitigation plan."

The governor "has the ability and the constitution to end this curtailment. That's part of his role and part of his job," Murdock said.

He believes that he and fellow farmers in the state are being "checkmated legally."

Fourth generation farmer John Boyd Jr. argues Black farmers are 'facing extinction' under Biden as the administration pushes to give Ukraine aid.

"He's [Idaho governor] choosing to try to make the two groups, us and this canal system, which down in southern Idaho, try to fight it out in what we call mitigation and come up with a private agreement among ourselves, rather than following the way the Idaho Constitution and the water law has kind of dictated that it should be," he argued

"We are not experiencing a full economic benefit of the resource," Murdock expressed.

The Idaho Department of Water Resources did not respond to Fox News Digital's request for comment.

Comment: As noted in the X-posts below, this is just the latest avenue whereby US farmers, like their European, and Canadian, brethren, are seeing their livelihoods and their country's food supply under attack; and whilst this appears to be one of the more brazen moves, the endless food plant fires, paying farmers to 'rewild and retire', the removal of subsidies, and so on, reveals that there's also a myriad of covert efforts to disrupt and destroy the supply chain:

American Farmer Breaks Down What's Taking Place In Idaho

In addition to the water shutoff order on a half million acres of farmland impacting farmers and about 6,400 water users. The Government is targeting chicken farms and cattle across the US

"They are coming for this food system and they're coming for the homesteaders"

"Idaho was supposed to be like this big potato, conservative, you know, live that rule life kind of a place. But if you've been following the stuff that's been going on in Idaho lately, something's that the tides are changing in Idaho.

In the last couple of videos, we've been talking about how they've been calling the chickens because of the bird flu. And I want you guys to understand too that they're using the PCR test for that. And I want you to go do your homework on how reliable that test actually is.

Okay, You guys gotta start peeling open this onion:

On May 16th, May 16th, just a short while ago, news surfaced of an outbreak at Hendricks Poultry in Iona County. And the company announced 400 layoffs, and that's 6.5 million poultry likely will be killed to stop the spread in Ionia County alone. Nearly 91 million poultry in the US are affected.

With outbreaks in 48 states as of Friday, according to the Center of Disease Control, additionally 9 states including Michigan have reported outbreaks of the Avian Flu in cattle and with 49 herds across the US are impacted.

Okay, I have more here. Don't go anywhere now. I'm telling you guys, they are coming for this food system and they're coming for the homesteaders.

Please understand me when I'm telling you. The whole deal, they have to control all of the food or it's not gonna work. This is gonna be a kind of a slow fast process. Right, It's not gonna happen like overnight or anything, but they are moving towards that right now at record speed.

And they're gonna use this stuff to get you there through the fear and everything"

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The Idaho Farmland Water Shutoff Rabbit Hole

"Wanna come down a rabbit hole with me? If you haven't heard, right now in Eastern Idaho, 500,000 acres of farmland is without the use of water. This happened on May 30th when the Department of Water Resources ordered 6,400 groundwater users to shut off their water. They're saying it's due to a predicted yearly shortfall and to noncompliance to mitigations. But this is a half a million of farmland.

That's our food supply. And Idaho farmers are asking for our help. They are asking that we call the governor and let him know that water curtailment is not the answer. Here's where the rabbit hole comes in. Buckle up.

And again, I am nobody. I'm just an American. These videos are for entertainment purposes only, and none of this is my opinion.

Here are some facts that can be found with an Internet search:

There's a company called Jervois Operating out of Salmon, Idaho.

This is a $150 million dollar facility (see video) that was then given an additional $15 million from the Department of Defense.

And as of June 2024, today, now, they've been given the green light to operate 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and they're mining for cobalt.

Cobalt's used for lithium batteries, and they need to use a lot of water to do so. But that's been known. There were numerous articles warning about this situation.

It's known that the extraction process leads to water scarcity, and that water curtailment order came one day prior to that company getting the green light to mine 24/7.

But remember, lithium is used for the batteries in our phones, the batteries in electric cars, and for military infrastructure.

So do with that information what you will. But the farmers, they're simply asking that we call and let the governor know that water curtailment is not the answer."