The Senate Ag Committee held a hearing Thursday to look at Country of Origin Labeling and what’s at stake regarding trade retaliation from Mexico and Canada. Leo McDonnell testified on behalf of the United States Cattlemen’s Association supporting COOL. However, he did request that instead of repeal to avoid tariffs, changing COOL to a voluntary program would let everyone win and allow U.S. cattle producers to differentiate their product from imported.

Senate Ag Committee Chair Pat Roberts told the committee the risk of retaliation is too high and must be avoided through repeal.

However, Roberts also conceded that the committee would be looking at the voluntary program draft introduced by Ranking Committee member Debbie Stabenow of Michigan as a compromise. He says it would be similar to Canada’s voluntary labeling.