Ciscomani & Trump officials tout proposal to support cotton farming during Marana visit

U.S. Rep. Juan Ciscomani and Trump administration officials visited Marana on Thursday to roll out a new initiative they say will help prop up cotton farmers, who have faced big challenges in recent years.

USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins. U.S. Small Business Administration Administrator Kelly Loeffler and the Republican congressman held a closed-door roundtable with local farmers before announcing the launch of the Great American Cotton Plan.

The plan, which includes a push to open new foreign markets for American cotton and various federal subsidies including crop insurance, marketing programs and other support, comes at a time when cotton farms have been hammered by inflation, higher gas prices, rising labor costs and a drop in overseas sales.

Ciscomani, seeking a third term in November in Congressional District 6, called Thursday’s announcement “another demonstration of this administration and this Congress’s priority on how we’re going to drive this forward and continue to take care of the people that feed us every single day.”

Cotton farming has a long history in Arizona and is considered one of the state’s five C’s — core industries that also include copper, cattle, citrus and climate. The state was the third top producer of Pima cotton in the United States and the industry was worth more than $322 million in sales in 2022, supporting nearly 1,500 jobs statewide, according to a UA College of Agriculture, Life and Environmental Sciences study.

Cotton exports took a major hit after President Donald Trump launched a trade war in his first administration. China sharply limited cotton imports during the first Trump term, although exports to the country began to bounce back during the Biden administration. China imposed new restrictions after Trump returned to office in 2025 and began imposing tariffs again, according to an analysis of USDA numbers by industry website FarmProgress.

Rollins said Trump’s use of tariffs had been a success.

“Under the first term, the president recalibrated trade around the world,” Rollins said. “That China phase one and phase two deal opened up markets that had never been opened up before, for especially our row croppers, but really for everybody. … It was a really good and extraordinary win for our farmers and ranchers.”

Ciscomani and Rollins announced the launch of the Great American Cotton Plan in Marana on May 28. | Ivy Kleinman/TucsonSentinel.com

Rollins said the Biden administration did not hold up the terms of Trump’s trade agreements but in his second term, Trump was working to establish new deals, including an agreement with Indonesia to import a minimum of 163,000 metric tons of cotton annually for the next five years.

“I believe that these markets that are opening up are going to solve, in large part, a lot of the challenges our farmers in the farm economy have faced, especially in the last five years,” Rollins said.

Rollins said all of the cotton farmers expressed their concern about a reliable water supply. An ongoing drought in the Western United States has strained the Colorado River’s supply and the seven states that rely on the river’s water – upper basin states Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, Wyoming and lower basin states Arizona, California and Nevada – were unable to come to an agreement on how to allocate the limited supply of water by a February deadline.

The U.S. Department of Reclamation is now proposing a plan that includes significant cuts to the amount of Colorado River water that flows to Arizona.

“My commitment to the farmers and ranchers at this roundtable is that I’m going to go back to Washington and really lean in for the farmers and ranchers of this state and get more involved,” she said. “It’s obviously not a USDA question, but I work so very closely with (Secretary) Doug Burgum at the Department of the Interior.”

Ciscomani, who hosted a closed-to-the-press tour of his district with Burgum in April, called ensuring Arizona continued to receive water from the Colorado River “a survival issue for Arizona.”

“These negotiations are not final yet,” Ciscomani said. “What we’ve seen so far in the allocation is troubling.”

Ciscomani added that sealing a deal might be difficult because Arizona’s Democratic senators, Mark Kelly and Ruben Gallego, have not been more agreeable with the Trump administration.

“We need senators to step up as well, including both of our Arizona senators that have chosen to have an adversarial relationship with the White House instead of a working one, so that impacts the negotiations, of course, and that goes for every Lower Basin state,” Ciscomani said.

Kelly spokesperson Melissa Bahati said the senator’s “focus has always been on securing Arizona’s long-term water future, not scoring political points.”

“He is committed to ensuring any final agreement is fair and provides certainty for Arizona communities, tribes, farmers, and businesses that rely on the Colorado River, and he is willing to work with anyone in the administration to advance Arizona’s interests,” Bahati said.

Ciscomani is seeking reelection in one of the most competitive districts in the nation. His Democratic challenger in the November election, JoAnna Mendoza, said the GOP congressman had voted in favor of policies that have made life harder for farmers.

“No amount of photo ops will erase the fact that Juan Ciscomani sold Arizona farmers out by voting to gut health care, protect reckless tariffs and greenlight the war in Iran that’s jacking up prices on everything from diesel to fertilizer,” said Mendoza.

“Southern Arizonans can see right through Ciscomani’s B.S.,” she added “As the daughter of farmworkers who grew up working the cotton fields in Pinal County, I will always stand with Southern Arizona farmers and our working families.”