Hi, everybody.
Hi, Secretary.
It's a little cold out here.
It's freezing.
I know. I did put my gloves on. Um, let me get close to the microphone. First of all, uh, such a great meeting with the president and, uh, spent a couple of hours with him. Have some of the great farmers, uh, standing behind me. I, we didn't even plan for this. It just happened.
Yeah.
But, uh, really representing all the row crops from all across this country, those that we were focused on today with this new trade package. Uh, we talked a lot in there about, um, really the, the crisis that is facing a lot of our farmers losing 150,000 farms over the last number of years. Um, lots of, lots of problems to solve, but this president is so focused on it, this trade package that was announced, um, the aid package that was announced to the bridge the next year where we believe, again, the markets open up, the input costs come down, the One Big Beautiful Bill, uh, moves into effect.
So with that, I'll take a couple questions. [Inaudible], you go.
Secretary Rollins -- [Inaudible]
Can you tell me who you're with?
Skylar Woodhouse, Bloomberg News.
That's right. Yeah, I was going to say Skyler.
Nice to see you again. Um, can you just explain? President Trump has said that the relief package would be funded via tariff, but there's been talk about using the CCC. Um, can you just explain how exactly that is going to work traditionally, the tariffs haven't been --
That's correct. The tariffs we consider an offset, we are using CCC funds. So we have set aside 12 billion. Um, we had to kind of, you know, move some things around, but we've got that 12 billion set aside. 11 billion announced today. One billion we're holding back for specialty crops. But as the president said today, he's open to more.
We really are trying to be so judicious, obviously with the taxpayer funds, want to make sure that these farmers can survive. But as you probably, a lot of you have seen that follow this, the minute you infuse funds from government checks into the farm economy, the farmers are still barely surviving, but inputs skyrocket; fertilizer, seed, equipment, et cetera.
So really working to, to try to solve this from all aspects.
Secretary Rollins, is, is this bailout today an acknowledgement that the administration's trade policies are hurting US farmers? And what would you say to US farmers who are worried that China is not going to hold up its end of the agreements that the president was touting?
Yeah. So two, so two quick things to answer your question. Um, when we were out here early this spring, I think I came out and gaggled with a lot of you after the president announced Liberation Day. And starting then, almost immediately, I said, "This president is resolutely focused. If there's any evidence that trade is compromising the farmer's ability to sell their product, that we will insure just as he did in term one negotiating China one, that we'll make sure that we are mitigating for that." The really interesting thing is though, now that we're eight, nine, 10 months into this, there is almost zero evidence, if any evidence that what they are doing and the challenges that our farm economy is facing in row crops has anything to do with these trade renegotiations; instead, the input cost being so high based on the last administration and not one new trade deal in four years, those are really the two basically driving factors in why the farm economy is today what it is. So you'll see we've pivoted from, you know, we're gonna do a, we're gonna do a, a, a, an aid package assuming the trade has been extremely, um, or potentially harmful.
And instead now we're just gonna support our row coppers based on those input prices, based on no new deals as we continue to monitor trade. On the China soybeans, um, Secretary Bessent, himself [Laughs] a soybean farmer, I think at least a couple of days ago, I think he just divested, uh, has said and the president has said and made very clear in that room that China will meet their commitments.
And so I have full faith in, in what they've said and I, and I, I'm very excited. I'm been encouraged by that.
Secretary Rollins, they've failed before to live up to those agreements.
That's true, but it's, it's a new day. I do not have concerns. I do believe that we will get there. 12 million, uh, then 25 million and 25 million and 25 million metric tons. Um, but it does go to the larger goal of opening up markets around the world so that we are not so reliant on China. So that's why we continue to focus on that.
Secretary Rollins, I know that today is focused on row farmers. I've spoken to hemp farmers in Kentucky and West Virginia who are deeply concerned about the provisions that we're talking, the government funding bill. Do you, does the administration back hemp farmers and do you think those restrictions should be peeled back?
Well, we are looking at everything on that right now. We don't have, and I, and I don't want to get some of the focus on that. He and I have spoken about it privately, but we're continuing to work that out. So we're here to support the farmers. We want to support rural America, but we also want to marry that to the health of our country.
And I think that's part of what we're trying to weigh.
Secretary, this is [Inaudible]. So, uh, look, can you clarify? Is this an 11 or 12 billion dollar package today?
Thank you for that. Um, it is a $12 billion has been identified. Today we announced the movement of 11 billion, holding one billion back for specialty crops, which were not included in today's announcement.
And the 11 billion came from the CCC? The 11 billion?
11 billion from the CCC. Yes. All 12 billion will be funded.
Thank you, Secretary. On SNAP funding, you said last week that you were going to withhold funding to Democratic-lead states for refusing to hand over private recipient data. Are you going to do that? What day are you going to do that?
So we are working through that. And I want to level, Seth, this is not Democrat versus Republican, and it's not us being mean to Democrat states. This is those that responded to our letter this spring that we know there is so much significant fraud in the SNAP program that it is rampant. But up until now, the federal government had never asked states for data, for ensuring that, you know, dead people aren't receiving it or people using dead people's social security numbers, that people aren't getting it twice.
And in response to that letter sent to every state, by the way, I do a monthly call with the governors, the Democrat governors join too, for the most part. Uh, but as a result of that, uh, all the states that said, "Here's our data," were all Republican states. And when we got that data later this spring, that's when we found the 186,000 dead people in the 500,000 people.
And these are in red states where arguably there's often more control and less spending on some of these government programs. So yes, we are very serious about this. We're continuing to work out exactly what that looks like. We'll be making an, another announcement on that probably early next week on what that looks like.
But the message is this: just let us work together and figure out and ensure that these taxpayer dollars spent, $100 billion a year, 42 million recipients, that we're actually getting the aid to the people that need it the most and not to assist them that's rife with fraud.
If you withhold that funding though, would that be a violation of the San Francisco judge's order saying --
We're working all that through. There's so, um, obviously much that we have to ensure that we're, we're checking all the boxes and we're very serious about that. Um, I'm a former practicing litigator. I understand the law. I've studied constitutional law. Um, so we'll make sure that we're doing everything we can.
But again, my hope is that these governors will step up and say, "Yes, we wanna get rid of this fraud too." We understand there's nothing nefarious going on here. We just wanna make sure that the people that need it are getting it and that the taxpayers are protected in that. All right, y'all. Thank you so much everybody.
Thank you.