George Ervin "Sonny" Perdue III[1] (born December 20, 1946) is an American politician, veterinarian, and businessman who served as the 31st United States secretary of agriculture from 2017 to 2021.

Founder and partner in an agricultural trading company,[3] Perdue was elected governor of Georgia in 2002, defeating incumbent Roy Barnes and becoming the first Republican to hold the office since the Reconstruction era.

He later served from 2012 to 2017 on the Governors' Council of the Bipartisan Policy Center in Washington, D.C.[4][5] On January 18, 2017, President-elect Donald Trump announced that he would nominate Perdue to be Secretary of Agriculture.

[11] Perdue played quarterback at Warner Robins High School and was a walk-on at the University of Georgia,[12] where he was also a member of the Beta-Lambda chapter of Kappa Sigma fraternity.

After serving as a member of the Houston County Planning & Zoning Commission in the 1980s, Perdue ran as a Democrat for a seat in the Georgia General Assembly.

[14] He defeated Republican candidate Ned Sanders in 1990 and succeeded Democratic incumbent Ed Barker as the senator representing the 18th district.

[20] His committee assignments included Ethics, Finance & Public Utilities, Health & Human Services, Reapportionment, and Economic Development, Tourism & Cultural Affairs.

He won the 2002 Georgia gubernatorial election, defeating Democratic incumbent Roy Barnes 51% to 46%, with Libertarian candidate Garrett Michael Hayes taking 2% of the vote.

[23] Perdue advocated reforms designed to cut waste in government, most notably the sale of surplus vehicles and real estate.

[25] Late in the evening of March 29, 2005, the penultimate day of the legislative session, Representative Larry O'Neal, who also worked part-time as Perdue's personal lawyer, introduced legislation making capital gains tax owed on Georgia land sales deferrable if the income goes to purchase out-of-state land, also, unusually, making the tax break retroactive.

However, Perdue was faced with a Democratic House that would not allow the 1956 flag to be included in the referendum, due to its Confederate origins, and he needed support for a tobacco tax he wanted to pass to raise revenue.

[35] In a 2014 editorial published by National Review, Perdue criticized attempts by "some on the left or in the mainstream media" to connect climate change to weather events.

"[38] According to a March 5, 2008, proclamation by Perdue, "Among those who served the Confederacy were many African-Americans, both free and slave, who saw action in the Confederate armed forces in many combat roles.

The Georgia Department of Natural Resources figures showed 21,101 people visited the Perry facility in fiscal 2015, which ended June 30.

[49] During meetings with Georgia state port officials, then-Governor Perdue discussed his family business's use of a terminal, then started a new export company in Savannah soon after leaving office.

The United States Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry overwhelmingly approved his nomination on March 30, with a 19–1 vote.

[51] In September 2017, Politico reported that, according to 42 reviewed resumes, the department hired 22 former Trump campaign workers, many of which had no significant agricultural knowledge or experience with federal policies.

[60] Current and former employees of the ERS were strongly critical of the relocation to Kansas City, saying the resulting exodus of scientific and economic talent caused disruption to federal research, especially on climate change and food security.

Economists in the USDA's research branch were told to include disclaimers in their peer-reviewed publications stating that the findings were "preliminary" and "should not be construed to represent any agency determination or policy".

[63] In August 2019, Lewis Ziska, a USDA plant physiology climate scientist, quit after department administrators attempted to impede the publication of one of his studies in the journal Science Advances.

On December 30, 2016, Perdue's company AGrowStar purchased property and a facility from Archer-Daniels-Midland (ADM), a large American agribusiness corporation that the Department of Agriculture regulates.

After the sale, the huge boiler on the property was sold for approximately $500,000, easily covering the cost of the purchase even if the rest of the land had been valueless.

Critics argued that the deal should be investigated, and speculated that ADM, which spends millions of dollars on lobbying regardless, used the property sale as a bribe for favorable treatment.

[70] Perdue's assets during his time as Secretary were placed in blind trusts, as is common to prevent financial conflicts of interest.

The complex arrangements were criticized as breaking the spirit of the rule, however, and that Perdue and his family's ties to his corporation were not distanced as much as the law intended.

The Washington Post detailed several wish-list items that ADM achieved: loosening of regulations on pork production, fewer inspections, helping lobby against proposed government bans on glyphosate by Thailand and Vietnam, and promoting ethanol and biodiesel.

[75] In 2006, while still governor, Perdue made a cameo appearance as the coach of the East Carolina Pirates football team in the movie We Are Marshall, large portions of which were filmed in Georgia.

[76] In 2006, Perdue's financial disclosure forms revealed that he had a net worth of approximately $6 million and received compensation of $700,000 that year.