Resources
BRATTIN VOTED TO ALLOW CHINESE OWNERSHIP OF MISSOURI LAND
Rick Brattin voted to override a gubernatorial veto of Senate Bill 9, a landmark piece of legislation that successfully repealed a decades-old prohibition on foreign ownership of Missouri agricultural land. By establishing a new legal threshold allowing foreign entities to own up to 1% of all state farmland (approximately 300,000 acres), the bill directly facilitated the acquisition of Missouri’s largest pork producer, Smithfield Foods, by the Chinese-owned WH Group. Despite his role as a leader of the Missouri Freedom Caucus and his vocal demands for a total ban on Chinese land ownership, Brattin’s 2013 "Yes" vote remains a significant political liability, as it provided the essential legislative framework for the foreign holdings he now characterizes as a national security threat.
- Missouri House Journal, SB 9, 11 September 2013
- Missouri Senate, SB 9 (2013) Bill Summary
- AP News, “Missouri moves to lift ban on foreign farm owners,” 18 June 2013
BRATTIN OPPOSES TRUMP TARIFFS
"I would say, uh, that the most difficult thing would be probably the tariff aspect would be the one thing, being a free-market conservative, would be the thing that I disagreed most with.”
- This week in Missouri Politics, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aLK4j57HzZ8, July 17, 2022
MISSED VOTES
Rick Brattin has missed 392 votes. This year, he has missed more than a third of final bill passage votes.
Despite missing four consecutive votes on budget bills including those appropriating funds for the Department of Public Safety, the National Guard, and the Department of Health and Senior Services, Brattin returned to the floor to vote in favor of HB 2012 —the bill that appropriated funds to pay the salaries of legislators and other elected officials.
Brattin failed to vote on a bill that would penalize employers who hire illegal Aliens
- Missouri Senate Journals, Second Regular Session, 2026
- Missouri Senate, HB 2012, Third Reading: 23 Yeas - 11 Nays, Brattin Vote: Yea, 6 May 2026
- Missouri Senate, HB 2366, Third Reading: 31 Yeas - 0 Nays, Brattin Vote: Absent, 29April 2026
