Portrait of senior male farmer standing in front of field 
By Kimberly Wilson ·Updated March 31, 2026 < /> Getting your Trinity Audio player ready… The story of Black land loss in America is long, painful and very well documented.
Over the last century, Black farmers have lost an estimated 16 million acres, much of it through discrimination by the very federal agencies that were supposed to serve them. A program created under the Biden administration was one of the first real attempts to start reversing that, directing nearly $300 million toward helping underserved farmers get access to land, capital and markets. It was two years in and the USDA just shut it down.
On March 23, the USDA sent termination notices to 49 of the 50 organizations that held contracts under the Increasing Land, Capital, and Market Access Program. The program, funded through the American Rescue Plan Act, had awarded close to $300 million across five-year contracts that began in 2023. The contracts stretched across 40 states and territories. Terminations went into effect just three days later.
The program had been built around the specific barriers that have kept underserved farmers locked out of agriculture for generations. Things like down payment assistance for land purchases, access to startup capital, market development support and succession planning so that farmland could stay in families rather than be lost or sold under pressure. The organizations that received awards ranged from nonprofits and farmer associations to universities and tribal governments.
The USDA’s justification for the cuts centered on claims that the program ran afoul of the administration’s stance on diversity, equity and inclusion priorities. Termination letters, signed by a Farm Service Agency official, described the program as involving preferential treatment and wasteful spending. The letters pointed to a directive Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins issued in early 2025 ordering that existing grants be reviewed and that programs free from DEI considerations be prioritized going forward.
In practice, that shift is already narrowing who gets access to federal support—and who gets left out.
Dr. JohnElla Holmes, CEO and President of the Kansas Black Farmers Association, was working with six farmers who were actively preparing to buy small farms when the cancellation hit. According to a statement released by the National Young Farmers Coalition, she has since said those opportunities may be gone entirely.
John Boyd, who founded the National Black Farmers Association and has spent decades pushing for federal accountability on agricultural discrimination, said in an interview with TheGrio: “They don’t want Black people to participate in these programs.”
Some organizations are pushing back. At least one ILCMA awardee is involved in litigation arguing the administration cannot legally cancel contracts Congress already authorized. Twenty states and Washington, D.C., have filed suit challenging the USDA’s authority to withhold congressionally approved funds, and House Agriculture Committee Ranking Member Angie Craig has called the cancellations unlawful.
Recipients have a 30-day window to appeal. Whether that leads anywhere remains to be seen.
For the farmers who were mid-process, gathering paperwork, calculating payments, finally seeing a real path to ownership, last week’s news meant starting over. For some, that path to ownership may not come back.
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