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President Obama's fight for rural America is personal. He was raised by a single mom and grandparents from Kansas. He hails from a farming state, Illinois.

Tom Vilsack

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Tom Vilsack
Age: 74
Born: 1950
Born: December 13
Lawyer
Politician
United States Secretary Of Agriculture
Pittsburg
Pennsylvania
Thomas James Vilsack
Thomas James Tom Vilsack
State
Farming
Fighting
Grandparent
President
Mom
Hails
America
Obama
Illinois
States
Raised
Kansas
Fight
Grandparents
Personal
Hail
Single
Rural

More quotes by Tom Vilsack

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It's how you make decisions that matters, and that ought to be the question that people ask of any candidate for any executive office, whether it's mayor, governor or president. How do you make decisions? Who do you want in the room helping you make those decisions?
Tom Vilsack
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Food is a fairly significant aspect of my life. I have struggled mightily with food. With my weight. And I'm conscious of it. So I have a sensitivity to people who struggle with their weight.
Tom Vilsack
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If we are to transition to a new economy and to lead it, we must start by transforming our schools.
Tom Vilsack
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I can't give you a specific number today, in large part because the analysis upon which we would make that determination has not been completed. . . . I think it is fair to say there may be additional costs associated with a farming operation, but it is very difficult to quantify.
Tom Vilsack
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I don't think the face of the Democratic Party is Nancy Pelosi.
Tom Vilsack
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I think the Democrats have - we really have failed to be in rural America, in the sense of having our leaders spending time talking to folks in rural America. The president Barack Obama has been there, but other than the president and vice president, we have had not a whole lot of conversation in rural America.
Tom Vilsack
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One out of every 12 jobs in the economy is connected in some way, shape or form to what happens on the farm.
Tom Vilsack
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Somewhere between 50 to 60 percent of the food you eat has been touched by immigrant hands, and it is fair to say some of them are not here as they should be here. But if you didn't have these folks, you would be spending a lot more - three, four or five times more - for food, or we would have to import food and have all the food security risks.
Tom Vilsack
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Strong communities ... embrace change. New discoveries require us to think differently and approach things differently, to think anew.
Tom Vilsack
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The Obama administration will continue to fight for a comprehensive immigration solution that includes AgJobs and a stable workforce for our farms.
Tom Vilsack
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But It doesn't make sense for us to have a continued reliance on a supply of oil where whenever there is unrest in another part of the world, gasoline prices jump up. We need a renewable fuel industry that's more than corn-based, of course, and there are a whole series of great opportunities here.
Tom Vilsack
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The rise of childhood obesity has placed the health of an entire generation at risk.
Tom Vilsack
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We have a long tradition in this state of caring for our neighbors - it is truly an Iowa value.
Tom Vilsack
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The future of healthcare security should include flexibility from the federal government to allow us to serve the state's most vulnerable citizens.
Tom Vilsack
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I think people have to remember where we were in 2009. We were losing 800,000 jobs a month. We had an unemployment rate in double digits. We had poverty rates soaring. We had kids who were food insecure. Today in 2016, we have a lot less unemployment, a lot less poverty, and a lot fewer kids who are food insecure.
Tom Vilsack
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Food during my early years was a very difficult issue for me. I grew up in an addictive family. My mother had serious problems with alcohol and prescription drugs. I was an overweight kid. I can remember back in those days there weren't the strategies that there are today to deal with those issues.
Tom Vilsack
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More than half of America's rural counties are losing population and with it, political representation.
Tom Vilsack
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When you've paid your debt to society, you need to be reconnected and re-engaged in society.
Tom Vilsack
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What Republicans have done in my view is that they are systematically dismantling a sense of community in America.
Tom Vilsack
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There is more potential for economic growth in rural America than at any time in decades.
Tom Vilsack