Rancher's Advocate. People's Advocate. Animal's Advocate.
Colorado Springs
Joined October 2010
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- Following1.1K
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Mike Callicrate retweeted
I was harvest maintenance superintendent at the Greeley beef plant when the sign said ConAgra. Before that it said Monfort. After that, Swift. Today it says JBS. Same kill floor every time. What changed was where the money that plant made went home to.
Mike Callicrate retweeted
The big meatpackers failed us during COVID, and rancher Mike Callicrate says they're failing us again.
"The big plants are failing us now."
Giant packing plants are closing across the country, leaving ranchers with nowhere to sell their cattle.
Meanwhile, the small local plants that could fill the gap can't compete with packers that dump their costs onto ranchers, workers, and communities.
Rancher Mike Callicrate’s solution is simple:
"If the government would prioritize purchasing to the small local regional plants... what you support prospers."
Instead of propping up the meatpacking monopoly, Washington should invest in the local processing ranchers actually need.
@MikeCallicrate
Hallie Shoffner is right on farming and farm policy: youtube.com/watch?v=BzDsCFGN…
Mike Callicrate retweeted
Rancher Mike Callicrate has seen firsthand what happens when schools cut out the corporate middlemen.
A Colorado Springs school district dropped Sodexo, started buying local meat and produce, and saved money.
Mike says the food service giants have been running a racket:
"There's almost a cartel of food management companies... Compass, Sodexo, Aramark, and they really dominate food management across the country."
When a few corporations control what ends up on our kids' plates, taxpayers pay more and local ranchers get shut out.
"You go back to local, you scratch cook, you employ people that actually cook, you pay them better wages."
@MikeCallicrate
Now that we’ve reached the inevitable end of what monopoly power delivers, a simple reminder follows:
When Profiteering Betrays Public Trust – It’s Time to Break ‘Em Up! nobull.mikecallicrate.com/20…
Mike Callicrate retweeted
I believe this will be considered one of the most important videos in US history from this time.
Mike Callicrate retweeted
Brutal….rural America and the graph looks like hogs went from the mortgage lifter to the mortgage.
The pork receipt. Where a dollar spent on pork went in 2025, from USDA ERS.
Hog farmer: 24.0¢
Packing: 15.6¢
Store: 60.4¢
In 2021 the farmer's share was 25.8¢. The second chart shows retail, wholesale and farm pork prices back to 1970.
We need more independent packing in this country. The Big 4 own more of the market than most people know, and the independent guy gets squeezed a little more every day.
Mike Callicrate retweeted
Producers build a plant they complain. Big packers who they say have to much of the kill close a plant they complain. They should change the name to RComplain 🤪😂
Walmart is expanding its reach into the cattle and beef industries, building a supply chain that stretches from cattle genetics to the retail meat case. But what does that mean for independent American ranchers?
Through investments, partnerships and production requirements, Walmart is gaining greater influence over how cattle are raised, marketed and processed. While new processing capacity can create opportunities for producers, increased vertical integration raises serious concerns about market access, price discovery and rancher independence.
As more cattle move through coordinated corporate supply chains, independent producers risk losing competing buyers, bargaining power and the freedom to make their own business decisions. The poultry and hog industries offer a warning of what can happen when farmers retain ownership of their operations but become dependent on corporations that control production and marketing.
R-CALF USA is urging federal antitrust agencies and USDA to examine Walmart's expanding influence over the beef supply chain and enforce laws that protect competition. Independent ranchers need competing buyers, competitive cattle markets and the freedom to negotiate the value of their cattle.
Watch 📷: Walmart’s Beef Empire Threatens Rancher Independence
Like in the U.S. - Food security at risk as Britain's abattoirs hit 'critical low' news.mikecallicrate.com/food…
"This year I will not buy one calf and take any more risk. I will try to see how much beef I can sell off the ranch directly to consumers and adjust how many cows we keep around. It is not our job as producers to take piles of risk to “grow the herd” when the government or cartel can vaporize it all in a news flash."
See: news.mikecallicrate.com/colo…
Colorado passed LL and MM to fund better meals for kids. Now, nearly a year later, we haven't seen a single order for beef from Colorado schools.
Full interview: Should Colorado Schools buy Local Meat? | Side Dish with Schniper - youtube.com/watch?v=VACpefda…
@SecRollins @_Regenaissance @REGENETARIANISM @GGunthorp @AJRichards @yearlins @SBakerMD @ifixhearts
Mike Callicrate retweeted
This is Tommy. Tommy had a question about my allegiances. Listen to the end to hear about his.
Mike Callicrate retweeted
Harvest is underway, and farmers are buying fertilizer to put on their fields after harvest.
Phosphorus and potassium are higher than they were a year ago.
Farmers who contract to buy anhydrous ammonia to apply in the spring are finding prices 20% higher than they were a year ago.
Not to mention that they’ll be paying 70% more than last year for the diesel needed to apply the fertilizer.
For many farmers, it is a bitter harvest.
Fuel and fertilizer costs eating their profits. Trade policies that are driving up the cost of machinery. Foreign markets gone dry thanks to needless trade wars. A Congress that went home to campaign without passing a farm bill.
Little wonder the rising discontent in America’s heartland.
Little wonder the rising anger in rural America about the way rural Americans have been treated by the political class in Washington.
They should not be surprised when rural America expresses its discontent at the ballot box.
We are the Rural Independence Initiative.
Fighting for change in Washington, affordable food prices, and real relief for the farmers who grow our food.
Join Us - farmactionfund.us
Donate - farmactionfund.us/donate
Joe Maxwell, President
Mike Callicrate retweeted
We need serious financial repression and wealth taxes because these billionaires simply stole their money. It’s not their property, it’s theft.
Coreweave CEO Michael Intrator says the market is acting irrationally by selling his stock.
A run through SEC filings reveals Michael Intrator has been “acting irrationally” as well, selling $907 million worth of $CRWV shares this year alone.
His cofounders Brian Venturo and Brannin Mcbee have also been acting irrationally. The trio has sold a combined $3.3 billion of stock since the IPO. Venturo is the second biggest insider seller of any American company this year.
Their benefactors at Magnetar Capital have also been acting irrationally. They have sold more than $5.5 Billion of Coreweave stock since the IPO.
A lot of people seem to be acting very irrationally.
Mike Callicrate retweeted
The cows and the sows could buy a farm and support a family when I was young. Rural America was a better place then….
Mike Callicrate retweeted
Diesel hit six dollars and thirty cents a gallon last week.
That's more than 70 percent higher than a year ago, and it landed right in the middle of harvest.
So what's Washington's answer?
A deal to buy diesel from Russia.
The first shipment is 300,000 tons—if it even gets here. That’s a little more than half what America consumes in a single day.
The entire deal with Russia through the end of the year is less than what America consumes in 4-8 days.
Even if Russia delivers everything it has promised, the amount represents only a fraction of America's annual diesel consumption—and analysts doubt it will substantially lower prices.
This is on top of the hoopla about allowing truckers to use red-dyed diesel.
What does that do to help farmers? Zero. Nada. Zilch.
Farmers already run dyed diesel in their tractors and combines. All it does is force farmers to compete with truckers for the same supply of red-dyed diesel.
The trouble with the grand press conference and window dressing coming out of Washington?
Farmers know they are being conned every time they pay the diesel fuel bill.
We are the Rural Independence Initiative.
Fighting for change in Washington, affordable food prices, and real relief for the farmers who grow our food.
Join Us - farmactionfund.us
Donate - farmactionfund.us/donate
Joe Maxwell, President
Mike Callicrate retweeted
"My name is Chaz Self, and I just filed a temporary restraining order against the state of Wisconsin. When my wife and I took over Grassway in 2016, the farm we now call home, we had one dream to feed our community. Becoming a first-generation farmer, I believed in the dairy state was possible. 10 years later, DatCap and the Secretary Randy Romanski are trying to bankrupt us, and the question is why. "
Yet another example of government overreach, trying to destroy another farm and family.