As Biden picks people for rural policy positions, some say he needs an overseer for rural issues, and for good politics

The Biden administration "is facing growing pressure to appoint a rural envoy within the White House to oversee a national strategy to uplift rural communities facing severe health and economic challenges," Liz Crampton reports for Politico. "Members of Congress and advocates are making the case that the problems plaguing rural regions exacerbated by the pandemic run so deep that a coordinated federal response is critical."

The center of attention for the moment is the Department of Agriculture, where longtime Biden friend Tom Vilsack will return as secretary, the job he held for eight years under Barack Obama. Vilsack gave his first interview as secretary-designee to Art Cullen of the Storm Lake Times in his home state of Iowa, and listed eight areas "that need significant work or even historic work: Covid-19 relief, equity and inclusion, climate and regenerative agriculture, rural economic development, nutrition security and assistance, open and competitive market, USDA employee morale, and Forest Service management in an era of climate-driven wildfires."

Justin Maxson

The administration has already signaled that the Rural Development branch of USDA will be run differently, by picking to run it Justin Maxson, who has been executive director of the Mary Reynolds Babcock Foundation, based in Winston-Salem, N.C., and before that head of the Mountain Association for Community Economic Development (now the Mountain Association) in Berea. Ky. Under Maxson, the Babcock foundation ran a large rural grant program for Vilsack late in the Obama administration.

"The Rural Development branch of USDA has long been neglected by both Republican and Democratic administrations, as it’s been consistently underfunded and understaffed," Crampton writes.

Perhaps even more important appointments are Katharine Ferguson as Vilsack's chief of staff and Stefanie Feldman as a senior adviser to Susan Rice, director of the White House Domestic Policy Council. Ferguson is associate director of the Aspen Institute's Community Strategies Group and director of the Council of State Governments' Regional and Rural Development Initiatives, and Feldman was policy director for Biden's campaign, deputy director of domestic and economic policy for him as vice president, and is a board member of the Center for Rural Strategies, where she was a college intern. She is a native of Georgia.

Democrats see rural action as essential for both policy and politics. “There has got to be definitive investments that are innovative or this administration will have no future in a rural vote,” said Charles Fluharty, founder of the Rural Policy Research Institute, which studies demographic trends and policy impacts on rural communities.

“I certainly think there has to be a big emphasis on developing rural America,” former Kentucky governor Steve Beshear told Crampton. “It has to come from the White House.” He added, “It is past time that the rural areas of this country be targeted for not only economic development, but for health care, for broadband access, for all of the things that will lift this whole country up.”

Crampton writes, "Democratic lawmakers say that embarking on a rural strategy is an immediate way for President Joe Biden to draw a contrast with former President Donald Trump, whose leadership they argue failed rural Americans, most clearly with the pandemic that has disproportionately impacted rural areas. Biden's platform lays out many ambitious goals for rural regions, such as having the agriculture industry play a key part in fighting climate change, which his advisers believe translates into paying farmers for improving the environment as well as generating more "green" jobs.