WASHINGTON (AP)—After months of delay, the Senate on Monday confirmed former Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue as agriculture secretary. He was officially sworn in Tuesday, becoming the 31st U.S. secretary of agriculture.
Perdue is the first Southerner in the post in more than two decades. He's the son of a farmer and has owned several agricultural companies.
At his confirmation hearing in March, Perdue assured nervous farm-state senators that he will advocate for rural America, even as President Donald Trump's administration has proposed deep cuts to some farm programs. He promised to reach out to Democrats, and several Democratic senators have said they will vote for him.
Still, Perdue, 70, is getting a late start on the job. Trump nominated him just two days before his inauguration, and then the nomination was delayed for weeks as the administration prepared his ethics paperwork. Perdue eventually said he would step down from several companies bearing his name to avoid conflicts of interest.
As agriculture secretary, he is in charge of around 100,000 employees and the nation's food and farm programs, including agricultural subsidies and conservation efforts, food safety, research and rural development programs for small towns.
Perdue's main task over the coming year will be working with Congress and coordinating his department's input on the next five-year farm bill. Current farm policy expires next year, and lawmakers on the House and Senate agriculture committees will have to find a way to push it through Congress amid heightened partisan tensions and concerns over spending.
At his hearing, he pledged to help senators sustain popular crop insurance programs and fix problems with government dairy programs.
Perdue may also find himself in the uncomfortable position of defending agriculture in an administration that has given the issue very little attention, despite Trump's strong support in rural areas. Trump has proposed a 21 percent cut in USDA programs and has harshly criticized some international trade deals, saying they have killed American jobs. But farmers who produce more than they can sell in the United States have heavily profited from some of those deals, and are hoping his anti-trade policies will include some exceptions for agriculture.
At the hearing, Perdue said he would be a "tenacious advocate and fighter'' for rural America when dealing with the White House and other agencies and noted a growing middle class around the world that is hungry for U.S. products.
"Food is a noble thing to trade,'' Perdue said.
After Perdue, remaining nominees for Trump's Cabinet to be confirmed are Robert Lighthizer for U.S. trade representative and Alexander Acosta for labor secretary.