U.S. Senate confirms Perdue as ag secretary
According to Reuters, the U.S. Senate has confirmed former Georgia Governor Sonny Perdue as secretary of agriculture.
According to Reuters, the U.S. Senate has confirmed former Georgia Governor Sonny Perdue as secretary of agriculture. Lawmakers voted 87 to 11 in favor of Perdue, whose nomination earlier passed the Senate Agriculture Committee with only one vote in opposition. Trump nominated Perdue, 70, in January but progress on his confirmation was slow, with media reports suggesting that undoing his various business entanglements caused delays in the ethics filings.
Perdue, who holds a doctorate in veterinary medicine and was raised on a dairy farm, is the first agriculture secretary from a southern state since Mike Espy of Mississippi, who served from January 1993 to December 1994. Perdue’s home state of Georgia accounted for just 2% of total U.S. agriculture exports in 2015.
“The only legacy that I seek is the only one that any grandparent or parent seeks—to be good stewards, and to hand off our nation, our home, our fields, our forests, and our farms to the next generation in better shape than we found it,” said Perdue. “Making sure that Americans who make their livelihoods in the agriculture industry have the ability to thrive will be one of my top priorities. I am committed to serving the customers of USDA, and I will be an unapologetic advocate for American agriculture.”