Agriculture Department employees have been ordered to delete landing pages discussing climate change across agency websites and document climate change references for further review, according to an internal email obtained by Politico. 

The pages no longer accessible include the one on the Partnerships for Climate Smart Commodities, a program that is supposed to make payments to entities to help farmers produce in a way that is more sustainable but also brings in more income. 

Before leaving office, Robert Bonnie, the agriculture undersecretary for farm production and conservation in the Biden administration, said that if the Trump administration attempted to stop those payments, commodity groups involved in the partnerships would probably defend them.

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack used the Commodity Credit Corporation, USDA’s line of credit at the Treasury, to come up with $3.1 billion to create the program.

The remaining funds are in an account at the USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service waiting to be paid out on a quarterly basis, Bonnie said.