Senate Democrat Voices Optimism for Ag Secretary Nominee's Approach to Food Trade
Sen. Heidi Heitkamp, D-N.D., voiced optimism during a radio interview (here) that agriculture secretary nominee Sonny Perdue would advocate for maintaining robust agricultural trade with Mexico. “The thing that we need to do on trade, in particular, is we need…
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to have a very vocal voice in places like Mexico saying our American producers still want to trade with Mexico, and they’re interested in maintaining those long-term relationships,” she said. “And if we don’t have that from the top down, I think we’re going to have some tough times ahead in agricultural trade.” The Senate Agriculture Committee on March 30 voted to clear Perdue for a full Senate vote. Heitkamp expressed concern about the U.S.'s ability to open up agricultural trade with Japan, after President Donald Trump withdrew the U.S. from the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which would have opened that market to more U.S. food exports. She noted a recent conversation with U.S. trade representative nominee Robert Lighthizer. "He believes in doing bilaterals," she said. "But he's going to have a tough time putting agriculture on the table with Japan, which I think is the first place he's going to go."