Ah, the poor American farmer. An unpopular “death tax” was “killing” them until President Trump came along.

Only it’s not true. Very few families actually pay an estate tax after the death of the owner — what Republicans have long derided as a death tax.

In 2017, for instance, only 690 businesses and farms of all sizes had estates large enough to fall under the federal estate tax, according to the Tax Policy Center. And just 80 of them were small farms or businesses.

Read:Tax cuts will deliver caffeine rush to economy in 2018, but it might not last

Republicans have long complained the estate tax forces family members who inherit assets to sell off some of them to pay the large tax liability triggered by the transfer of ownership. Family farms in particular are usually cited as the main victims.

“The estate tax was killing the farmers,” President Trump said Wednesday as Congress passed the largest overhaul of the tax code since 1986. “They were forced to sell farms at bargain basement prices. They don’t have to do that anymore.”

Few if any instances of families selling farms to meet estate-tax liabilities have been reported, however. And most of the nation’s 2.2 million farms are too small to even qualify.

Even fewer will be subject to the higher estate tax after the Trump tax bill goes into effect next year.

The top rate was reduced to 35% from 40% and the exemption was doubled to $11 million for single filers and $22 million for couples. Assets under those amounts won’t be subject to the tax.