Cuban-born Elsa Murano, the top USDA meat safety official during the Bush era and later president of Texas A&M University, will meet President-elect Donald Trump next week as a candidate for agriculture secretary, said the Trump transition team. She would be the first person to meet Trump in nearly a month as a potential USDA nominee and could become the first Texan to lead the department.
Murano “comes very highly recommended … and obviously, her track record of running a major university speaks for itself,” said Trump spokesman Jason Miller during a tele-briefing with reporters. Fellow spokesman Sean Spicer said, “Next week, the president [-elect] will be meeting with Elsa Murano, she’s a candidate for Agriculture.”
A food scientist by training, Murano, 57, was agriculture undersecretary from 2001-04, resigning to become vice chancellor of agricultural and life sciences at Texas A&M, advancing to president of the university in December 2007. There was controversy over the selection process for president and in her first annual evaluation, she was given low marks for management and leadership. Murano disputed the assessment but resigned in June 2009 and returned to work as a professor.
When she left USDA, Murano said, “The last three years have afforded me a tremendous opportunity to enhance food safety in this country. I can leave Washington knowing that we have made a significant difference in improving public health through the application of science in all policy decisions.”
While Murano highlighted efforts to reduce contamination in the food supply, consumer groups had a somewhat rocky relationship with her, said Tony Corbo, of Food and Water Watch, who criticized her as an advocate of deregulation of meat inspection. Like others with USDA’s meat-safety portfolio, Murano promoted an approach that gives meatpackers a larger role in identifying diseased or unwholesome carcasses while USDA inspectors devote more attention to monitoring products and verifying that packers take steps to prevent contamination throughout processing.
The consumer group Public Citizen tied Murano and her husband, who worked at USDA’s Food and Nutrition Service, to efforts in 2002 and 2003 to encourage schools to buy irradiated meat for school meals.
At present, Murano is a member of the board of Hormel Foods, the Minnesota-based meat processor, said the Dallas Morning News. The newspaper said Murano “had political friction with then-Texas Gov. Rick Perry and other high-ranking Perry loyalists, which some speculate led to her eventual ousting” as Texas A&M president. “Murano still teaches at A&M, where she is a professor in the nutrition and food science department.”
If Trump nominates Murano, she would satisfy three demographics for the cabinet – a woman, a Hispanic and a Texan.
The second-most populous state with 27.5 million people, Texas is the No. 1 cattle and cotton producer.
Murano is the third Texan to be mentioned for agriculture secretary recently. Rancher Susan Combs, a former state agriculture commissioner, met Vice President-elect Mike Pence this week in Washington. Sid Miller, the current agriculture commissioner, was expected to meet transition officials soon.
Although Murano served in the Bush administration, she was floated as agriculture secretary in the Obama administration by Michael Froman, now the U.S. trade representative, reported Politico, based on an email hacked by Wikileaks.
North Dakota Sen. Heidi Heitkamp, a Democrat and member of the Senate Agriculture Committee, was the last person, on Dec. 2, to meet Trump who had the resume to lead USDA. She is likely to remain in the Senate, said Politico, based on comments to KFGO-AM in Fargo, ND. “I’m not saying ‘never never,’ but I will tell you that I’m very, very honored to serve the people of North Dakota and I hope that no matter what I do, that will always be my first priority,” said Heitkamp.