Black lawmakers call for claim action

WASHINGTON, July 31 (UPI) -- Black U.S. lawmakers say the White House has promised $1.5 billion in farm aid to Arkansas while claiming it can't pay a settlement to black farmers.

Six members of the Congressional Black Caucus called on President Barack Obama to find a way to compensate black farmers who suffered discrimination in government loan programs during the 1980s and 1990s, The Hill reported Friday.

As part of negotiations in the Senate to pass a small-business bill, White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel promised bill sponsor Blanche Lincoln, D-Ark, that the administration would pay out $1.5 million in disaster assistance to farmers while they wait for programs in a 2008 farm bill to be implemented, the Hill said.

Meanwhile, the administration has told black farmers it does not have the funds to pay a $1.2 billion agreement reached with the U.S. Department of Agriculture in 1999 to settle a class-action discrimination lawsuit.

If the White House can find $1.5 billion to pay mostly white farmers in Arkansas and other states, members of the black caucus say, it should be able to pay black farmers who suffered discrimination.

"The current hardships experienced by other farmers should not trump hardships placed on African Americans and Native Americans by the U.S. Department of Agriculture in the past," they wrote in a letter to the president.