'Ridiculous slap to the face': Iowa farmers decry Trump's latest move to curb ethanol sales

The Trump administration has been granting waivers to oil refineries that let them off the hook for using renewable ethanol in their fuels -- and Iowa corn farmers are not happy about it.

The Des Moines Register reports that the Trump administration's oil refinery waivers so far are "driving 15 ethanol plants to close nationwide," which has depressed demand for corn in Iowa.

"The exemptions are ridiculous and a slap in the face to farmers,” Curt Mether, president of the Iowa Corn Growers Association, tells the Des Moines Register.

Nick Bowdish, CEO of Elite Ethanol in Atlantic, went even further and said that corn farmers who still back Trump are "just voting to cut off their own economic prosperity." He also added that "it's a train wreck out here," referring to the current state of the ethanol market.

Poet, a South Dakota-based company that is America's largest ethanol producer, also announced this week that it planned to close a plant in Indiana, while also dialing back production in plants in Ohio and Iowa.

Monte Shaw, executive director of the Iowa Renewable Fuels Association, tells the Register that Poet is far from the only plant struggling.

"Seventy percent of U.S. plants are burning cash," Shaw said. "And you can only burn through cash for so long."