Mere days after “Liberation Day,” when President Trump imposed reciprocal tariffs on dozens of nations that have been exploiting the United States on trade, the global response has been swift—and telling. U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins revealed that more than 50 countries have already expressed an eagerness to negotiate and avoid being hit with stiff new trade penalties.
“We already have 50—five-zero—countries that have come to the table over the last few days, over the last weeks, that are willing and desperate to talk to us,” Rollins told CNN’s Jake Tapper on Sunday morning. “We are the economic engine of the world, and it’s finally time that someone, President Trump, stood up for America.”
The administration’s push to reorder global trade in a way that’s fair for all countries has sparked predictable panic among critics, but Rollins dismissed the uproar as premature and partisan. “Everyone, especially on your side, on the left, is freaking out,” she told Tapper, who bristled at the suggestion. “At the end of the day, this whole concept is about rebuilding an American economy around American goods, around American industry.”
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Rollins emphasized that the U.S. has long lived under foreign tariffs—whether from China, Brazil, Mexico, or even Australia—and said that the current trade regime has hurt American farmers and ranchers for decades. “Mexico won’t take our corn. Australia won’t take our beef,” she said. “The country of Honduras takes more pork than the entire European Union does.”
While Tapper pressed her on whether Trump’s tariffs are meant to be permanent or used as a bargaining chip, Rollins leaned into the administration’s broader economic vision. “This is a national security issue. This is about reshoring thousands, hundreds of thousands, millions of jobs,” she said. “This isn’t just some new sort of concept that just came up under the Trump years…. This started in 1791 with Alexander Hamilton.”
Rollins pointed to the country’s historical use of protective tariffs to build economic dominance and argued that Trump is simply returning to America’s founding vision. “For 150 years, that was the approach… and that’s when America went from basically a frontier country to the world’s largest, most exceptional economic power.”
She didn’t deny that the tariffs are a powerful negotiating tool but insisted that Trump’s approach is multi-faceted—combining tariffs with deregulation, tax cuts, and energy independence. “Right now, we’re two business days into this new American order,” Rollins said. “The president is resolute in his focus and his boldness and his fearlessness… to ensure that we’re putting America first.”
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Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, in a clip played during the segment, echoed the administration’s position bluntly: “I don’t think there’s any chance that President Trump’s going to back off his tariffs. This is the reordering of global trade.”
With dozens of countries already “burning the phone lines” into the White House, as Rollins put it, it’s clear that Trump’s aggressive trade posture is forcing the world to adapt—on America’s terms. And it’s about time.
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