More than a quarter of the land in the United States, mostly in the West and Alaska, is owned by the federal government, a massive stewardship challenge and a frequent cause of friction with local governments. President-elect Donald Trump apparently has settled on Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, a proponent of oil and gas development, to run the Interior Department, which oversees 416 million acres. But transition officials are silent on his choice for the Agriculture Department, which controls nearly 193 million acres of forest and grassland.
Precedent says the USDA nominee should be announced soon. Since 1976, the average date for a nomination is Dec. 17. With the Trump team pointing to McMorris Rodgers for Interior, 10 of the 15 members of the cabinet are known. Agriculture usually comes in the second half of the cabinet-selection process.
North Dakota Sen. Heidi Heitkamp “has emerged as [Trump’s] leading choice for agriculture secretary,” said Politico over the weekend. But it was unclear if the post was offered or if Heitkamp would accept it. If she did, it would open the door for Republicans to add to their narrow Senate majority, considering Heitkamp squeaked to victory in 2012.
More than a dozen possible USDA nominees have been mentioned in print. They range from governors, such as Sam Brownback of Kansas, to state agriculture directors, such as Sid Miller of Texas and Ted McKinney of Indiana, to members of Congress, such as Rep. Tim Huelskamp of Kansas, and to agribusiness leaders such as Bruce Rastetter of Iowa.
Former Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue met Trump on Nov. 30 in New York, two days before Heitkamp sat down with the New York businessman. Nick Ayers, a top aide to Vice President-elect Mike Pence, is a former campaign manager for Perdue.
Former Texas Gov. Rick Perry, whose first statewide office, from 1990-98, was agriculture commissioner, has been mentioned for USDA and Energy.
The Interior Department manages the bulk of federal land, with duties that include coal leases, off-shore drilling and national parks and wildlife reserves.
“McMorris Rodgers shares Trump’s view that big energy companies should have more access to federal lands,” said The Seattle Times. “She also supports opening the Atlantic Ocean for drilling, fought efforts to regulate hydraulic fracturing on federal lands and has sought to expand logging. She has opposed dam removal for wild salmon runs on the Snake River and Endangered Species Act protection for gray wolves.”
The selection of McMorris Rodgers dovetails with the Republican president-elect’s promises to bolster the U.S. energy industry by shrinking the powers of the federal government, said Reuters. “It follows Trump’s nomination this week of an another climate change skeptic and critic of federal regulations, Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt, to run the Environmental Protection Agency.”
Better known for running the farm-subsidy program or public nutrition programs such as food stamps, USDA’s portfolio includes the Forest Service. The agency is charged with managing its territory for “multiple uses and sustained yields of various products and services, including timber harvesting, recreation, grazing, watershed protection, and fish and wildlife habitats,” says a Congressional Research Report on federal land ownership.