Does the infrastructure bill include a tax on cows?

A popular post on social media falsely suggests that farmers will be taxed for each cow, including $6,500 a year for dairy cows, under the infrastructure bill before Congress.

But the bill, approved in August by the Senate, does not contain such a provision. The erroneous claim follows Oklahoma Rep. Markwayne Mullin’s false assertion that cows and pigs would be taxed under a separate, $3.5 trillion reconciliation bill that is supported by many Democrats. But the reconciliation bill as currently drafted includes taxes on methane emissions relating to oil and gas production—not from livestock. Meredith Blanford, a spokesperson for Mullin, acknowledged that fact. The estimated tax figures came from an analysis by the American Farm Bureau Federation, which has also issued a statement saying the bill does not include such a tax.