Will Trump’s beef plan actually lower prices for consumers?

( NewsNation ) — President Trump has announced a plan to temporarily lift tariffs on some imported beef to lower prices, but will it work?

Trump’s plan will temporarily suspend ground beef levies , allowing up to 300,000 metric tons of ground beef to be imported at a discount for 90 days. The imports will be sold at 25 percent below market rate, according to the president’s proclamation.

Cattle ranchers have pushed back against the plan, which they say hurts American beef producers. The White House has said it will help bring down costs for consumers.

The plan comes as affordability remains a top issue for voters in the lead-up to the midterm election.

Trump’s plan is limited in both scope and duration. The proposal only covers beef trimmings, which are mixed with other beef parts to make ground beef. Trimmings are parts of the cow left over after cutting steaks and other cuts.

The steaks and other cuts of beef aren’t included, so any relief seen by shoppers will be limited to just ground beef.

While 300,000 metric tons is a large number, it only represents about a 2 percent increase in beef supply, experts say . It’s also unclear whether the beef covered by the plan will be imported in addition to foreign beef already supplied to the U.S., or if the meat was headed to America anyway and will simply benefit from the temporary tariff relief.

Experts have also questioned where the 25 percent drop in price figure comes from. Food & Wine reported Trump may be conflating the tariff amount with a price drop, when in reality, the imported beef trimmings would be just one small part of the costs of producing ground beef and won’t necessarily result in those savings being passed on to consumers.

“Consumers are not gonna see that. They’re gonna see pennies, maybe, because it’s all gonna be captured by those big foreign packers and then the distributors and the retailers,” rancher Casey Parker told NewsNation .

Imported beef is typically frozen, and since grocery stores often rely on fresh beef when making ground beef, much of it is likely headed to food service , especially fast-food outlets, which won’t lower grocery bills for consumers.

Even if the imports do lower ground beef prices on grocery store shelves, any relief will be temporary, as the tariffs will only be lifted for 90 days, expiring at the end of November, a few weeks after the midterm election.