DOGE and SNAP
From the Ag Information Network, I’m Bob Larson. Ag Secretary Brooke Rollins, a former policy adviser to President Trump in his first term, is on board with her boss’s government downsizing including in her department.
Rollins recently weighed in on Trump’s order to vastly downsize federal government during an interview with Agri-Pulse …
ROLLINS … “Untold numbers of new people that have come to work for the government…the climate programs, the DEI programs…just in the last 24-hours, we’ve canceled almost a hundred DEI programs.”
But in the process, froze farm conservation and equipment contracts and targeted local farm to food programs with any diversity connection, despite multiple restraining orders.
Rollins insists the goal is to redirect savings to farmers, not to upend vital services as USDA shrinks …
ROLLINS … “The great people working in the local FSA offices and the other offices, those are the people that we will rely on the most to make sure that we’re doing our job, that we’re measuring our success.”
Meanwhile, Rollins has a new target in mind …
ROLLINS … “The SNAP program, which is food stamps, has grown 30 to 40-percent, just in the last four years. That’s (B) billions and billions of dollars.”
Rollins told the Washington Post she freed up $20-million last week for some EQIP, CSP and ACEP contracts, and vowed more announcements.
