Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins said Friday she hopes to beat the March 21 deadline set by Congress for distributing $31 billion in economic relief and disaster aid payments. 

“We've already got the process in place” to distribute the aid, which Congress authorized in December, Rollins said in remarks delivered virtually to USDA's annual Agricultural Outlook Forum.

She also acknowledged producers’ concerns about potential “repercussions” from tariffs placed on trading partners by President Donald Trump, but promised again that farmers would be “made whole” for financial losses. 

She pledged to provide another round of financial aid in the event U.S. farmers are caught in the crossfire of a renewed trade war. U.S. farm exports have so far been spared from China’s announced tariff retaliation – which has focused on agricultural equipment and other U.S.-made machinery and vehicles. But new tariffs on Mexico, Canada and China are slated to kick in next week.

Rollins said she is working to be part of trade discussions.

“My hope and commitment is that I will be in the room, but then on the back end, just as the president did with [former] Secretary [Sonny] Perdue … ensuring that we can make whole any immediate pain that is a result of that,” she said.

“With two weeks on the job, I've been briefed up on trade pretty significantly,” she said. “I've had a lot of conversations already with fellow cabinet members [and] with the White House and will remain ever-vigilant to ensure that our interests are at the table.”

Echoing a theme repeatedly hammered home by her predecessor, Ag Secretary Tom Vilsack, she also said the nation is losing too many farms.

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“I'm sure you've all talked about this … but one in 10 farms have disappeared in the past decade,” she said.

The secretary said she does not plan to be at headquarters in Washington, D.C., as much as in other parts of the country.

“I'll obviously be in Washington quite a bit, but my plan is to be out with all of you in the country, perhaps even more than Washington,” she said, adding she wants to get to all 50 states “very, very quickly.”

She did not address widespread layoffs of probationary employees at USDA or the freezing of billions of dollars in USDA contracts that have caused consternation in farm country, but did say that Trump “understands the challenges to our community. No one has the backs of our farmers and ranchers more than he does. We will take this one day at a time, and I'll be there.”

Rollins appeared virtually from Texas instead of in person at the forum in Arlington, Virginia. USDA Chief Economist Seth Meyer said Rollins’ flight to Washington, D.C., had been canceled at 2 a.m. Friday.

Rollins was “insistent upon being with you here this morning to provide comments,” said Meyer, who asked Rollins a few questions after she spoke.

The Office of the Chief Economist organizes the forum, which is celebrating its 101st iteration this year.

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