Hi, everyone.
Hi, secretary. Do you have a few minutes?
This is becoming a recurring theme for us. So, good to see everybody. I do -- we are about to go into a cabinet meeting. So, I've got a little bit of time before for just a few questions.
Brooke, what do you expect the impact on US farmers to be from the Chinese 84 percent tariff imposition?
Well, we're looking at that every day. We have teams across the government, whether it's USTR or Commerce or Treasury, of course, USDA. We've got teams that are literally hour by hour watching that. This president has a vision of realigning the American economy to ensure that we are putting America first.
I know you all have heard me say this, but I think it's worth saying again that for decades we have lived under a tariff regime. It just hasn't been an America -- an American tariff regime, and this president has been resolute that he is going to fix it. So, while we're in this period of uncertainty, and yesterday obviously was a great day today, we're a little bit down.
We'll see a little bit more movement and adjustment by the market as we move forward. But for the farmers and the ranchers, I spent time with two big groups last night. I'm on the phone constantly. I was on with ten governors right before I came over to the White House this morning on a Zoom. We're in constant communication for our row crop farmers, especially, for our wheat and sorghum, etc.
We believe that these changes will in short order create unlimited and unprecedented prosperity for these farmers, but if not the USDA is there in the short term to ensure just as we did in term one that our farmers are taken care of. Thank you.
How surprised were you by the pause in tariffs?
You know, I wasn't surprised. I think that the president is extremely involved and very intentional in what he says, what meetings he takes, what phone calls he has. And the conversations were ongoing. And you saw yesterday what happened and it was a good day. But again, it's just one more step toward that prosperity and that realignment of the American economy.
I'm sure we'll talk about it at length in the cabinet meeting in just a minute. Thank you.
Secretary Rollins?
Yes, sir.
-- potential aid packages for American farmers and egg producers, if you need to. Specifically you said now that you hope you won't have to do it.
That's right.
-- market conditions. But if you do have to do it, what kind of timeline are we talking about? How quickly would that be sort of on the president's desk?
Well, what -- It's going to take a little bit of time to fully understand the implications, especially for our wheat, sorghum, corn, soybean, etc., that they're just in planting season right now. We'll move towards the end of the summer and into the fall. But we're literally looking at it every single day.
And so, I don't have an answer because we just don't know what's going to happen. But if anything, I hope you all have seen that this administration moves at light speed and working seven days a week, 20 hours a day. Uh, this will hopefully move quickly if necessary, hopefully not, but if necessary.
So, maybe potentially at harvest time later this year?
That is when I think we'll have the best idea of exactly what the consequences look like. Yeah, thank you.
Have you talked to farmers who are worried about losing market share and they point to 2018 as an example, what would you say to their concerns?
Well, first of all, let's fully understand that the 2018, 2019 deal with China was a really good deal, but what happened is we didn't stay for that contiguous second term and the Biden Administration did not hold China accountable to what it was that was in the deal. So, there are some mitigating factors there that I think are really important for everyone to understand.
But having said that, let me shift to today, this is a completely different environment, a completely different set of facts and circumstances that, again, ultimately we believe will have a massive positive effect for all of our farmers. You combine that with the fact that under Joe Biden, inputs went up 30 percent for our farmers and ranchers.
I think that was across the board perhaps, but especially in AG where I'm looking, at a time where our trade deficits increased $49 billion. So, the cost for the farmers went up. Our goods were not being sold around the world as they were under Trump 1 and I think we announced just in the next few months, I'll be in Vietnam and India and Brazil and Peru and Japan as we're continuing to open up those markets.
So, I don't think for a lot of reasons, we'll see that again. Yes, sir. One more.
Egg prices to -- when [Inaudible] weighing in, what do you say to American consumers, The wholesale prices are down, but we're still not seeing it at the grocery store.
Well, so today I think it was today, maybe in the last hour or so, we saw inflation decrease just a little bit, but a decrease for the first time since COVID. And that's an incredible story to tell. The president's idea of tax cuts and deregulation and tariff reorganization and realignment of the economy.
The markets are beginning to adjust to that. We're seeing a decrease in airfare, a decrease in used cars, a decrease in gasoline. The wholesale prices of eggs, to your question, have gone way down. I think we're down depending on who you're looking at, what numbers between 50 and 65 percent. We've said all along the retail prices will just take a while to catch up. We're also moving into the Super Bowl of eggs which is Easter.
So, from the beginning I've said this is sort of the high price for retail for eggs, but we feel very confident that will continue to come back down. Thank you all so much. Thank you all.
That's exactly --