For the nascent industrial hemp sector, a handful of projects funded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture was a small signal that maybe things were looking up. Six federally backed projects, representing tens of millions of dollars in promised support for climate-smart conservation and agriculture, could demonstrate hemp’s potential in regenerative farming, sustainable construction, bioplastics, and carbon sequestration.
But now, thanks to the Trump administration’s latest playbook, every one of those projects is either delayed, defunded, or dead in the water.
Yes, dead. Or, in USDA terms, “reprioritized.”
Among the possible victims: The largest-ever hemp-specific grant awarded under the USDA’s Regional Conservation Partnership Program (RCPP) – a $19.6 million initiative led by the National Hemp Association to grow climate-smart hemp across the Chesapeake Bay Watershed – has been left in limbo.
Then there’s the “Partnerships for Climate-Smart Commodities” program. As of April 13, all hemp-related projects under that umbrella were cut off. Not just canceled, but canceled with flair—framed as part of a partisan purge of “climate scams” by Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins, who accused the entire initiative of being “largely built to advance the green new scam at the benefit of NGOs.”
That’s not just canceling climate-forward investment—it’s slandering it on the way out the door.
Strategic sabotage
Let’s be clear: these weren’t just climate pipe dreams or university science fair projects. The canceled projects included:
- A $15 million initiative to develop open-access data and digital marketplaces for climate-smart hemp production across five states.
- A $5 million plan to build out carbon-negative feedstock supply chains in Kansas, Missouri, Oklahoma, and Texas.
- A nearly $5 million collaboration led by Florida A&M to use hemp for high-efficiency carbon sequestration.
- Projects in Virginia and Tennessee exploring hemp bioplastics and greenhouse gas offsets in underserved farming communities.
Collectively, these projects were designed to elevate hemp as a serious, science-backed material for 21st-century industries—from carbon-negative building materials to biodegradable packaging and even energy storage.
Now? All that funding is vapor. The USDA has agreed to honor “eligible expenses” incurred before April 13. Everything else? Good luck recouping those costs from the same administration that once used Sharpies to redraw hurricane paths.
Existential moment, again
The Trump administration is treating the entire climate-smart funding ecosystem as a partisan threat, not a public good. In fact, the USDA press release didn’t just cancel the Partnerships for Climate-Smart Commodities program—it called it a “slush fund.” Their words, not ours.
So to the dozens of hemp researchers, entrepreneurs, cooperatives, extension agents, engineers, tribal partners, and others who participated: The joke’s on you, you liberal weenie tree huggers. The federal slush fund is gone.
And the irony? Rollins insists this is all about “redirecting” money to “practical” rural energy investments. But don’t expect them to explain what those are. The administration has offered no roadmap—just vague buzzwords, deliberate ambiguity, and political point-scoring.
Meanwhile, hemp—already ignored or marginalized by most state and federal institutions—has been left stranded. Again. The industry is scraping for infrastructure investment, operating at the edge of viability, and now must contend with the loss of what little support it had clawed its way into.
Climate-stupid
This is what political sabotage looks like: slandering evidence-based environmental programs, pulling the plug on innovation, and pretending you’re for farmers when you’re really protecting fossil fuel incumbents and culture war narratives.
The hemp industry didn’t get rich off CBD. It didn’t get the overall boost it was promised after the 2018 Farm Bill. And it certainly isn’t getting a boost now. If hemp has a future, it’s going to come from private capital, not public backing. Because with this administration, climate-smart has become climate-stupid.