As trade tensions with China continue to simmer, Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins confirmed the Trump administration is standing ready to support farmers whose sales are hurt by the growing trade dispute with China.
Rollins said during an interview on CNN’s “State of the Union” that while the administration hopes a bailout won’t be necessary, they are actively preparing for the possibility.
“We are watching it and analyzing it every single day,” Rollins said, adding that the administration is in constant communication with lawmakers on Capitol Hill to secure the necessary funding if the trade war continues to hurt agricultural exports.
In 2018, as trade negotiations with China intensified, the first Trump administration rolled out a $28 billion bailout to support American farmers impacted by retaliatory tariffs. The bailout provided immediate financial relief to producers of key commodities like soybeans and pork. (RELATED: Trump Says He’ll Work With Farmers To Not Immediately Deport Key Laborers)
Farmers drive their tractors to rally in support of Trump in St, Paul Minnesota. (Photo by: Michael Siluk/Education Images/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)
This time around, farmers are split on the potential of another similar measure.
“We hope there will be a bailout,” Barry Evans, a sorghum and cotton farmer in Texas told the Wall Street Journal. “If we don’t get something, it will be quite a disaster.” Nearly 90% of sorghum exports went to China last year.
Josh Gackle, chairman of the American Soybean Association, on the other hand, said soybean farmers want “access to a free and fair trade market,” not government handouts. However, he still hopes the Trump administration can “find a way to address that financial impact on our farms” from tariffs. Soybean sales have also plunged this year.
Meanwhile, Rollins delivered some welcome news for consumers, announcing that wholesale egg prices have dropped by 58% in just six weeks. She said consumers will soon see the difference at the store.
“The actual wholesale cost of eggs is down, and the retail cost will soon follow,” she said.