An Amish farmer in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, embroiled in a lawsuit by the state’s Department of Agriculture, claims the agency concealed results and falsified evidence in an attempt to run him out of business.
Attorney Robert E. Barnes, who represents Amos Miller, owner of Miller’s Organic Farms, wrote in a court filing released during a Thursday hearing that the agriculture department “materially misled the court with perjured affidavits based on events that occurred many years before.”
The hearing centered on extending the injunction the state attorney general’s office obtained in January to prevent Mr. Miller from selling raw dairy products after alleged failures to adhere to the government’s regulatory policy led to the farm being the subject of an armed raid by officials on suspicion of selling “illegal milk,” among other products.
Following the raid, the Pennsylvania Office of the Attorney General and the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture filed a lawsuit against Mr. Miller, alleging that he had violated Pennsylvania’s Milk Sanitation Law by operating without government-mandated permits. However, in an affidavit submitted to obtain a search warrant, agents falsely claimed a person died in 2016 after drinking raw milk traced to Mr. Miller’s farm, according to Mr. Barnes.
In the filing, Mr. Barnes wrote: “The problem is: it never happened. ... In fact, the elderly lady who died had advanced cancer, and never drank any raw milk product of Amos Miller’s, as her caretaker testified to under oath and a former Wall Street Journal reporter had already previously investigated and independently found.”
Further, the Jan. 4 search of Mr. Miller’s farm, in which the agency claimed to have found listeria, a food-borne pathogen, in storage tanks and raw milk products, had also been fabricated, according to Mr. Barnes, who claimed that the agency’s own testing on samples taken from Mr. Miller’s farm “confirmed no listeria problem in many of the samples taken, and no problems found at all in most of the samples taken of any kind.”
The Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture did not respond to a request for comment.
In his order, Judge Thomas Sponaugle ruled that the injunction against Mr. Miller would stand and that allowing the farmer to continue to sell his product would “usurp the authority and responsibility” of state lawmakers, who have deemed that commercial producers of raw dairy must obtain permits and undergo state inspections.
Pennsylvania grants permits to manufacture and sell raw milk and raw cheese but not butter, yogurt, and eggnog, which Mr. Miller sells to customers nationwide. It’s illegal to commercially produce those products in Pennsylvania.
‘I’ll Decide What I Eat’
The mandate to halt all sales of Mr. Miller’s dairy products inspired widespread anger over what critics have called a blatant example of government overreach.Before the hearing, crowds of protesters—many of whom were customers holding signs “Food Freedom'' and “I’ll Decide What I Eat”—gathered outside the Lancaster County Courthouse.
For decades, a community of dairy farmers and nutrition advocates have campaigned for the right of individuals to produce, sell, and consume fresh, unprocessed milk. Advocates claim the consumption of raw milk can lead to numerous health benefits, including improving the immune and digestive systems, as well as being a cure for eczema and irritable bowel syndrome. The pasteurization process not only destroys dangerous pathogens like E. coli, salmonella, and campylobacter but also destroys its healthy nutrients, according to raw milk enthusiasts.
However, government agencies insist the potential downside of drinking raw milk far outweighs any perceived benefits.
Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) told The Epoch Times that a corrupted alliance between “Big Ag” and rule makers at the Department of Agriculture has created a monopoly that has led small, independent farmers to the brink of extinction.
“Amos Miller is being prosecuted for operating outside of the onerous regulatory regime that keeps small farmers from providing nutritious food directly to consumers,” said Mr. Massie.
Mr. Massie hopes that the new legislation he has authored will make it easier for small farmers and ranchers to serve their customers and remain a sustained part of the American food landscape. The Processing Revival and Intrastate Meat Exemption (PRIME) Act would give individual states the freedom to permit “intrastate distribution of custom-slaughtered meat such as beef, pork, or lamb to consumers, restaurants, hotels, boarding houses, and grocery stores.”
The bipartisan bill, co-authored by Rep. Chellie Pingree (D-Maine), already has 50 co-sponsors and is set to be attached to the upcoming farm bill, according to Mr. Massie.
“My raw milk bill and my PRIME Act need to pass now!” he added.
