Beef prices are at record highs and the plan to fix them — cheap foreign beef — is already backfiring, which is bad for shoppers and worse for American ranchers.

• Trump paused tariffs on imported ground beef and promised it would sell well below current prices, but won't name the countries it comes from.
• Most of it is Argentinian, and 30,000 pounds of it has already been recalled in Florida and Texas over safety concerns.
• The real cause of high prices is that the US cattle herd is the smallest since the 1950s, shrunk by nearly 9% since 2020 and hit by a flesh-eating parasite.
• Ranchers say cheap imports just undercut them and kill any reason to rebuild herds — 66 farms and ranches are shutting down a day, and rebuilding takes three years per animal.
• There's no label telling you what country your beef came from, so shoppers can't tell; China has rejected beef from an Argentine plant the US buys from over a banned antibiotic.

Outlook: Beef prices are unlikely to drop much for consumers, and more recalls or a food-safety scare would put pressure on the import deal.