A prominent Iowa farmer criticized Democratic presidential candidates in a local interview for being tone-deaf on U.S. trade policy and supporting radical policy proposals that favor handouts.
"They all seem to want to give everything away," Tim Bardole, the president of the Iowa Soybean Association, said on KDSM Fox 17. Bardole said he would vote for a Democratic presidential candidate but claimed the remaining candidates are far too radical.
When asked which candidate worried him the most, Bardole answered, "Probably Bernie Sanders."
Sanders’s campaign has leaned heavily on government-run and government-subsidized policy proposals. He has pushed for the cancellation of student debt, federal subsidization of higher education, and the abolition of private health insurance. Sanders estimated the cost of his Medicare for All plan would cost $40 trillion over 10 years and his campaign unveiled a $16 trillion Green New Deal plan.
Other Iowa farmers who were interviewed expressed frustration that many of the Democratic presidential candidates have blamed President Donald Trump for fallout from a trade war with China.
"What President Trump has done, had to be done," one Iowa farmer said. "We’ve paid the price financially for two years, and it’s time we get that trade back. That’s what we live on."
Bardole also said, "I’ve been asked, well, since President Trump has put these tariffs on you, how does that make you feel? Well, he didn’t. China put the tariffs on my product."
Sanders voted against Trump's U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement which revamped the 26-year-old North American Free Trade Agreement.