Ag Sec. Rollins Reacts To Thom Tillis Warning Of Potential 'Irreparable' Damage From Tariffs

3 days ago

During an interview on CNN's "State of the Union" on Sunday, Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins reacted to Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) warning of potential 'irreparable' damage to farmers caused by Trump's tariffs.

Fuel your success with Forbes. Gain unlimited access to premium journalism, including breaking news, groundbreaking in-depth reported stories, daily digests and more. Plus, members get a front-row seat at members-only events with leading thinkers and doers, access to premium video that can help you get ahead, an ad-light experience, early access to select products including NFT drops and more:

https://account.forbes.com/membership/?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=display&utm_campaign=growth_non-sub_paid_subscribe_ytdescript

Stay Connected
Forbes on Facebook: http://fb.com/forbes
Forbes Video on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/forbes
Forbes Video on Instagram: http://instagram.com/forbes
More From Forbes: http://forbes.com

Transcript

00:00So you say that America's farmers and ranchers understand there's going to be this short time

00:03of uncertainty and there were obviously financial help for farmers and ranchers during the first

00:09Trump administration. Take a listen to North Carolina Republican Senator Tom Tillis.

00:15Anyone who says there may be a little bit of pain before we get things right need to talk about

00:21farmers who are one crop away from bankruptcy. They don't have time. So we've got to be crisp

00:26on this implementation. Otherwise we can do damage that's irreparable to farmers and businesses.

00:32What's your response to Senator Tillis?

00:37So the bottom line is this. In the last four years the cost of inputs for our farmers went

00:42up 30 percent. In the last four years we had an agriculture export deficit that increased from

00:50zero when President Trump left to 49 billion dollars. Our farming and our farmers and ranchers

00:57are hurting. They are operating at profits of margins of profit that are thinner than they

01:02have in a really long time due to the policies of the last four years. But to Senator Tillis's point

01:10we have to be prepared that if there is longer term damage and this president has been very

01:16focused on this and I've been saying it pretty much ad nauseum for the last 50 days since I've

01:20been in office is that we will make sure that we have the funds in working with the senators

01:27and working with the appropriators that we can do what we did last time which I think

01:31Secretary Perdue last time spent about 25 to 28 billion dollars to mitigate some of the fallout

01:37from the last tariffs for the short term. The long term the tariffs worked. I mean the research

01:42shows that we had an increase in productivity increase in jobs etc. until frankly the Biden

01:48administration stopped enforcing some of those the deal once we left office in 2021. All right

01:54Secretary Rollins thanks so much for joining us today. We really appreciate your your time and

01:58your expertise. Thank you Jake.

Ag Sec. Rollins Reacts To Thom Tillis Warning Of Potential 'Irreparable' Damage From Tariffs

Category

Transcript

Recommended