President Donald Trump announced last week that the United States would boost foreign imports of ground beef to ease U.S. consumer prices. He didn’t say where it would come from. Now it appears that not even his top administration officials have the answer.

“I am not privy to talk about that,” Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins told reporters Tuesday when asked about which countries the beef would be sourced from. “I think the conversations are still going on.”

Later that day, Rollins told Spectrum News that she isn’t part of the White House’s conversations on the topic at all. Instead, she said, U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer was working on the policy, adding that the public would know more “very soon.” 

Greer hasn’t offered details on the beef’s sourcing, and neither has the president. When asked directly about where the beef would come from following the policy’s announcement Friday, Trump told reporters, “I don’t want to say,” but he indicated that “there are a few countries” he had in mind. 

Trump’s proclamation, signed Wednesday, allows up to 300,000 metric tons of ground beef to be imported “with no out-of-quota tariff” over the next 90 days and sold for 25% below market prices. He did not specify whether the government would directly subsidize the discount, or where the beef would be sold. 

The administration did not immediately respond to MS NOW’s request for comment on where the meat would be imported from.

Trump’s proposed policy drew a rare rebuke from many congressional Republicans, including some who rarely break with the president. Sens. Tim Sheehy and Steve Daines, both Montana Republicans, denounced the policy, as did Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wyo., and Rep. Mike Flood, R-Neb.

“Americans want US beef on the table — not foreign imports,” Barrasso said in a post on X. “Our ranchers don’t ask for special treatment. They simply want a fair marketplace. It needs to be easier — not harder — for Wyoming ranchers to feed America.”

Sen. Deb Fischer, R-Neb., a cattle rancher herself, said she was “extremely disappointed” by the White House’s decision. “We all want lower grocery prices, but as I’ve said for months, we cannot do it at the expense of American producers,” she wrote on X.

Trump tried a version of this last October, when he opened the market to Argentinian beef and drew similar flak from Republicans. The imports depressed domestic livestock values in the U.S., deepening a financial squeeze that has been building since the start of his second term.

Global tariffs and the war against Iran, which has closed the Strait of Hormuz, drove up the prices of diesel and fertilizer. Then, the screwworm parasite returned to American herds for the first time since 1966 — all while ranchers were still recovering from a 2022 drought that shrank U.S. herds to their smallest size since the 1950s.

Rancher advocacy groups have torn into Trump’s latest deal. The American Farm Bureau Federation and the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association each said that Trump’s plan would lock in high beef prices over the long term. 

“Bringing down the price of cattle will not bring the price of beef down for American families,” AFBF President Zippy Duvall said in a letter to Trump Wednesday. “Instead, it will discourage American farmers and ranchers from making long-term investments in herd rebuilding, extending the cycle of tight cattle supplies, high production costs and elevated beef prices for consumers.”

Lillie Boudreaux contributed to this report.

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