FIRST ON FOX — A coalition of more than 400 U.S. farm, agriculture and growers groups sent a letter to Senate leaders this week urging the swift confirmation of President-elect Donald Trump nominee Brooke Rollins to head up the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), praising her as a strong voice they see as well-positioned to speak to the interests of rural America.

The signatories included a whopping 417 national and state growers groups representing the interests of farmers, growers, hunters, ranchers, forest owners, renewable fuel associations and state departments of agriculture across the country — encompassing what they said is virtually "all aspects of American agriculture, food, nutrition and rural America."

The USDA is the agency that oversees the nation's agriculture and its practices. Its sprawling portfolio includes providing support for farmers, setting the standards for school meals and overseeing the safety of meat, poultry and eggs.

The letter was previewed exclusively to Fox News Digital and sent to Sens. John Boozman, R-La., and Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn. — the chair and ranking member of the Senate Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry Committee, respectively — just one week before Rollins was slated to appear before the panel for her confirmation hearing.

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In the letter, signatories praised what they described as Rollins’ foundational knowledge of agriculture, combined with her policy and business bona fides that they said made her uniquely qualified for the role of U.S. agriculture secretary.

Rollins "has been engaged in American agriculture since an early age," they said, noting Rollins’ childhood spent baling hay and growing livestock in Glen Rose, Texas — a small town some 70 miles outside of Dallas — as well as the summers she spent working on her family’s farm in Minnesota.

Later, Rollins majored in agricultural development at Texas A&M on a scholarship, before completing law school at the University of Texas. She went on to work for former Texas Gov. Rick Perry and then later served as director of the United States Domestic Policy Council during Trump’s first term as president. She then became president and CEO of the America First Policy Institute, whose mission is to "advance policies that put the American people first." 

The nonprofit think tank has called on Congress to restrict China's access to American farmland and has been critical of President Biden's energy policies. 

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In the letter, the groups said Rollins’ agriculture and farming bona fides, policy expertise and her business experience make her uniquely prepared to "provide effective executive leadership for USDA’s important, wide-ranging activities and large workforce."

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The timing of the letter and Rollins' pending confirmation hearing, slated for Thursday, comes at a crucial time for U.S. growers groups and agribusinesses across the country. 

It comes as lawmakers have stalled on a new farm bill, and on other key priorities for farmers and industry groups across the country. 

The 11th-hour passage of a government spending bill in late December helped narrowly avert a government shutdown, but it failed to provide the full extent of farm aid and other agriculture subsidies in the amounts considered necessary for many in the U.S.

In the letter, the groups cited Rollins’ "close working relationship" with the incoming president, which they said will "ensure that agriculture and rural America have a prominent and influential voice at the table when critical decisions are made in the White House."

In sum, the letter said, Rollins’ leadership at USDA is necessary to help "advocate for a new farm bill, stabilize an agricultural economy in decline, support the full food and agriculture and forestry value chain, and continue American agriculture’s long history of providing the most secure, affordable and nutritious food supply in the world."

Rollins is not expected to face staunch opposition to her nomination to head up the U.S. Department of Agriculture, and lawmakers who have spoken out to date have praised both her experience and strong knowledge of the agriculture sector. 

A New Year is upon us. It is a time of reflection for most of us. I often use this time to reflect on my deeds in the past year. What did I do that served the people in the right way? Were my intentions, however good they may be, the right ones? Or did they hurt? What can I do to improve myself and those around me? How can I continue to strengthen my relationship with my Lord?

But this time of reflection always comes with a slap to the face if you’re a Chicagoan and work to serve the people like I do: the release of the murder statistics for the past year. These tragic numbers make national news to our shame and remind us of our shortcomings as humans and neighbors. Every one of the murdered were not abstractions but individual souls worth saving and could have been saved. But we didn’t.

In this past year, until December 18, 564 Chicagoans lost their lives to murder. This is 43 fewer victims when compared with 2023 and it is significantly less than in 2021 when 797 lost their lives. There are those like Mayor Brandon Johnson who might try to sell this as progress, but how is going from 797 murders to 564 progress? Especially when most of it was self-inflicted?

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When I first began my work in Chicago in the early 2000s, the murder rate was tracking in the 600s. After me and others began serious outreach efforts to youths and gang members, we got the murder rates to track mostly in the 400s for a good run of several years.

Then we had the rise of Black Lives Matter in the 2010s and the years after the death of Michael Brown saw a tremendous rise in the murder rate. It jumped from 425 murders in 2014 to 778 murders by 2016 — largely to the police pulling back due to the anti-police sentiment of activists and politicians.

Then came the death of George Floyd and the Defund the Police movement. In 2019, before the world had even heard of Floyd’s name there were 498 murders. Then 772 in 2020, the year he died, and 779 in 2021. We lost hundreds of Black lives to the Defund the Police movement that was formed in the name of saving Black lives but, in reality, only put more power into the hands of self-serving politicians. The tragedy here is that not one politician or activist will face justice for their recklessness with Black lives.

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Previous Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot supported this movement. Current Mayor Johnson supported this movement. Both claim to know the interests and lives of Blacks and they claim to believe that Black lives matter. If that is true, then why did none of the Blacks, who lost their lives as the lawlessness increased during the George Floyd aftermath, matter?

It matters to me and so many people in my community on the South Side and also the West Side, where most of the 564 murders took place. It matters because so many of those murdered were young and in the prime of their lives. Ninety-one of the deceased were between the ages of 0 and 19. One hundred and seventy-seven were between the ages of 20 and 29. One hundred forty-five were between ages 30 and 39. Four hundred and twenty of them were Black and 110 were Latinos. Four hundred ninety-four were males. Five hundred and five of them died by gunfire.

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The one good thing about George Floyd was that it exposed the immorality of politicians and activists who exploit Black lives for cheap power. Though we were foolish enough as Chicagoans to elect the worst mayor of my life, Johnson, into office, there are many of us from community leaders to concerned citizens that realize it’s all-hands-on-the-deck time now. 

We know that Black Lives Matter is a lie. We know that our politicians will not fix our failing schools — after all, what do you expect from a Mayor who refuses to return a $150,000 donation given to him by a rapper facing murder chargers? We know that the harm from Defund the Police movement still lingers.  We know that our youth grow up believing more in the U.S. government than Jesus.

Aside from that, we are battling the disastrous effects caused by 60 years of liberalism. We are fighting the culture of dependency that has been ingrained into so many families generation after generation. We are fighting a culture of hopelessness.

We are fighting on so many fronts in this war, but we are making progress. We are saving lives. What we’re doing here is not magic. We use old-fashioned American principles: responsibility, accountability, merit, etc. We preach belief in Jesus and, if they are of another belief, we still encourage them. Most of all, we stress that one must have belief in themselves.

Call me a fool if you want, and if you do, answer me this: who deserves to lose their lives to senseless violence that is preventable?

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