Last week, Americans cocked our heads when Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins proudly declared to News Nation that her department ran 1,000 simulations and came up with a $3 meal that followed RFK Jr.’s new dietary guidelines. It was “a piece of chicken, a piece of broccoli, corn tortilla, and one other thing.” She was endlessly mocked.
So on Tuesday, she attempted to walk back her remarks: “I regret that I didn’t make it sound like a more robust plate because that is what I mean to make it sound like,” she told reporters outside the White House.
“A really big piece of chicken,” she explained, is what she meant last week. “And when I said a piece of broccoli, I meant like big…I’m a mom of four, and I cook broccoli a lot. For me, that’s a big head of broccoli, a baked potato, etc., a couple pieces of bread.” Wow! I mean, I was already relieved to learn she wasn’t suggesting a single floret, but now we get a potato and some bread? What a fucking treat.
She added that earlier on Tuesday, her department ran new numbers to discover that three full meals—and a snack—can cost $15.64. Bargain!
Brooke Rollins is still at it!
“We had run almost 1,000 simulations, and between $3 and $4 is a fair number if you can have access to that food. I just saw new numbers that were run: a full day, meaning 3 full square meals and a snack, is about $15.64.” pic.twitter.com/ThWZK3FuEK
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) January 20, 2026
“Part of me cringed about the criticism that I got because it wasn’t what I meant,” she continued, adding that she didn’t mean to be “flippant.” “But I also think that the left—or those that were attacking me—perhaps know that this is an issue that 90% of Americans agree on, it is one that no one’s really done anything about until this administration, and it is one where we will fundamentally, I believe, change the trajectory of our country by changing the health of our country.”
Assuming she means the cost of food—which Forbes did say 90% of Americans were “stressed out” about in August 2025—yes, affording what you put on your table is a pretty bipartisan issue. But as of 2025, the Trump administration has imposed the worst-ever setbacks to SNAP in its near-century-long history, then threw a party while millions lost food access, and then deliberately starved Americans to force an end to the federal shutdown. So… I guess he’s changed the trajectory, all right. Just not in the way she seems to think.
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