All-In with Chamath, Jason, Sacks & Friedberg
Brooke Rollins, Secretary of Agriculture | All-In DC
Sun, 04 May 2025
(0:00) David Friedberg welcomes Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins! (1:32) How she ended up in Trump's two administrations, history of the USDA (16:56) Trump's first 100 days, what needs to be reformed in the USDA (21:31) SNAP's massive impact on USDA budget: soda, obesity, health challenges; how being DC outsiders helps the Trump Administration (30:48) How she reconciles running a department with a lot of government intervention after coming from a free market background (34:33) State of US farming in 2025, labor costs, opening up new markets, and more (42:11) Working with DOGE, Farm Bill negotiation, stance on agricultural innovation Follow Secretary Rollins: https://x.com/SecRollins https://x.com/BrookeLRollins Follow the besties: https://x.com/chamath https://x.com/Jason https://x.com/DavidSacks https://x.com/friedberg Follow on X: https://x.com/theallinpod Follow on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theallinpod Follow on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@theallinpod Follow on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/allinpod Intro Music Credit: https://rb.gy/tppkzl https://x.com/yung_spielburg Intro Video Credit: https://x.com/TheZachEffect
Chapter 1: What is the background of Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins?
Can you call me Brooke?
Brooke. I'm wearing a tie. There's a degree of formality. You just came from a cabinet meeting.
Food security is national security.
America is the largest ag exporter in the world. These farmers don't want all these checks. No one wants a handout.
Exactly, no one wants a handout.
$15 billion a year is spent on soda.
Taxpayer dollars will be spent on sugary drinks and junk food that's making our kids sick. Absolutely not. Does that mean we shut them down? No, of course not. Part of that was having 300 executive orders drafted. We did it all very quietly. No one really knew it was happening. We're not here for the people to serve us like some monarchy. We're here to serve the people.
I'm here in Washington DC at the US Department of Agriculture to interview the 33rd Secretary of Agriculture, Brooke Rawlins. We just had an amazing conversation talking about Brooke's background, the work she's doing at the USDA, the impact Doge is having, food stamps, the sentiment of the American farmer, tariff and trade, and everything in between. Really amazing conversation.
Thank you to Secretary Rawlins for allowing me here today. I hope you'll enjoy the conversation. Besties. I think that was another epic discussion. People love the interviews. I could hear him talk for hours. Absolutely. We crushed your questions in a minute. We are giving people ground truth data to underwrite your own opinion. What do you guys think? That was fun.
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Chapter 2: How does Brooke Rollins view food security as national security?
First 100 days. Yesterday was the 100th day of President Trump. I'm like 70 days. Right. But on President Trump yesterday, but today we celebrated together at the cabinet meeting. And we're about, I'm going back over to the White House right after we finish to do more celebrating.
Great. Well, we appreciate it. The USDA is an incredible agency. It was founded under Abraham Lincoln, I believe. It was established under Lincoln. I was talking to your staff. I think 60% of American workforce was in agriculture at the time. And it's a really critical agency for American prosperity and has been really important
for food security and for the interests of America around the world as a trade partner, as the largest ag exporter in the world. The agency is incredible in terms of the scale, 29 sub-agencies, over 100,000 employees, 4,500 locations and an over $200 billion. annual budget. So really an incredible department to oversee.
But before we get into the USDA and talk a little bit about some of the work you're doing and have been doing, maybe we can talk a little bit about your background. Did you grow up on a farm? How did you get into agriculture?
So yes, I grew up in a really small town in Texas. We were not farmers or ranchers per se in Texas. I grew up on a small farm. We raised animals, we baled hay, but my family, my mom's side of the family, my grandmother, they had a big row crop farm in Minnesota. So I spent every summer on that farm, corn, wheat, soy, pretty much everything you could consider and think of.
So that was my row crop, which has actually been very, very helpful because coming from Texas and being more of a cattle raiser and being in cattle more, which is what I meant in Texas, it's really great to have sort of both sides of the house and I'm very appreciative to that. But yes, grew up in a very small town. We didn't have much. I was raised by a single mom, but we did have the land.
And on that land, we raised our animals. Again, we built our hay. I barrel raced every Friday night. I grew up in 4-H and FFA, went to Texas A&M on an agriculture scholarship, studied soil science and meats and feeds and feeding and really dove way into agriculture.
Knowing I would go to law school, I really had a heart for understanding policy and the people, but thought I would really stay in ag for the rest of my life and Obviously, sometimes the path diverts and changes, but even over the 20 years since I last worked 100% in agriculture, which was for Rick Perry when he was first governor, then quickly moved into all the policy.
But I've always stayed very much in touch and involved in ag and always really worked in ag policy, but as part of a much broader portfolio until this job. But no, listen, the USDA is the people's department. That was what President Lincoln's vision was.
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Chapter 3: What reforms are needed in the USDA?
It's not a party thing.
It's not. It's just... It is an entire industry that has been built around, this is the problem when the government gets too big. This is world history. Greece, Rome, Spain, France, every great world power has buckled under the weight of a government that hands out the largesse, that everyone's got their hand in the pot, and they buckle, and that's how they lose their place in the world.
And that is what, listen, I sincerely believe that without Donald Trump coming down that escalator, and listen, there were 17 guys and one girl, I think, running that, you know, in 15 when he did that. I was not the smart one that said, oh, there's the game changer. That's him. I was like, oh, I love that person, and I've known him forever. They're going to be so great.
It's not going to be Donald Trump. But at that moment in American history, without that human being who is literally willing to swing for the kit fences every single day, 100 times a day for the American people, who owes no lobbyists not one thing, We were all hired with the idea that we owe not industry, not lobbyists one thing. Now we need to listen to their concerns.
But every day, all day, we're called to do what's right. And I don't know that that's ever happened, at least in my lifetime, in governance, in federal governance.
I want to talk about the irony of running the USDA with your policy background. This is an organization that administers programs like SNAP, the federal crop insurance program, the direct payments program to farmers, commodity price support where the federal government, the USDA, is buying commodities to keep prices high.
And coming from a free market background, coming from a maximizing liberties background, small government background, wasteful government spending needs to be eliminated background, How do you reconcile the irony of running this department? And how do you think about where you want to take this department with that background over time?
Yeah, it's a great, this is, you're the first person to really dig down on this that I've talked to since I took the job. And it's an extremely insightful conversation. and thoughtful question that you raise because that's 100% true.
My entire background is how to get government out of people's lives and how to get government, quote, handouts out of the private sector and how do we downsize significantly everything that the government stands for and how do we let the markets work? I think two things. I have become an absolute avid believer in President Trump's vision on putting America first.
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Chapter 4: How does SNAP impact the USDA budget?
And whether it's India or Japan or South Korea or Brazil or Peru or the UK, I am going to all of those countries in the next few months. And this is just me on behalf of agriculture. This isn't our trade crew, our commerce secretary. I mean, it's just me. But I feel so blessed
bullish on the idea that if we are, we're on Trump time, we deploy Trump time, which is going as fast as you can, as hard as you can, for as long as you can around the world, we're going to open up so many new markets for our farmers. And then we solve for the labor issue, which you brought up, which is a really big issue.
Now, I think sometimes the Californians tend to inflate that because- What are you trying to say? Yeah, I know. They think a little bit differently about this.
I hear it in Florida too.
Yeah, well, and there's no doubt.
I'll give you one statistic from a large strawberry farmer. I work in strawberry as well as other crops. But the farmer mentioned that he did an analysis. He thinks that since pre-COVID days, the total labor cost in the strawberry industry has grown from $700 million a year to $2 billion a year. Wow. And that's really hurt margins.
And so it's really hard to net a profit, particularly in specialty crops, not row crops where everything's automated, but specialty crops where you're dependent on labor doing work in the field, harvesting product to be able to keep up with the lack of labor. And of late, there's been a lot of an exodus of immigrants that might qualify under the visa program.
So maybe, I don't know if you're active or spending, or the Department of Agriculture.
And I'll put a little note, a little cross the T on what you just said, and that is I'm a Texan, and our South Texas, the citrus farmers down there, think about in Mexico, for some of them, half a mile away they can see it, right across the border, now through the wall, they can see it, and it's $2 an hour. Those farmers are paying $2 an hour over there.
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