At an impasse with Democrats over his plans for large cuts in the food stamp program, House Agriculture Committee chairman Michael Conaway says he will write — and pass — a farm bill without them. The committee’s Democratic leader says Conaway would cut SNAP enrollment by 20 percent and subject more able-bodied adults to a 90-day limit on benefits unless they find jobs that provide at least 20 hours of work a week.
Conaway was expected to call a committee vote on the farm bill next month, although a date has not been set. The Senate Agriculture Committee is likely to draft its version of the farm bill shortly after the Congressional Budget Office releases its budget baseline on April 9, the day Congress returns from its spring recess.
In a statement, Conaway said he was “deeply disappointed and hurt, quite frankly,” that Democrats on the committee refused to consider his public nutrition proposals, which have been described in outline but not released in detail.
“If Democrats would like to re-engage, we will welcome them back,” said Conaway. “But in the meantime, we’re going forward. I need a bill that gets 218 votes. I don’t care if they are Democratic votes or Republican votes, we’re going to get 218 votes.”
If Conaway follows through with his plans, it would put an end to the often-stated — by both parties — goal of getting committee approval of a bipartisan farm bill that would move quickly through the House with few obstacles. The House defeated a farm bill for the first time in 2013, when conservative Republicans demanded the biggest cuts in food stamps since welfare reform in 1996. The House later passed separate “farm only” and public nutrition bills.
“The Democratic members of the House Agriculture Committee are unanimous in their opposition to the extreme, partisan policies being advocated by the majority. This opposition will not change,” said Minnesota Rep. Collin Peterson, the senior Democrat on the committee. An aide said Democrats were given an oral briefing but no printed version of Conaway’s proposals early this week.
The Trump administration has called for stricter time limits on SNAP benefits to so-called able-bodied adults without dependents (ABAWDs) and fewer ways for states to offer benefits to ABAWDs for more than 90 days in three years unless they work at least 20 hours a week or spend equivalent time in job training or workfare programs. Conaway says states do not press recipients strongly enough to find more remunerative work or to prepare them for it. An education and training program is now a small adjunct of SNAP, which is run by states with federal funding. The chairman claims that no SNAP recipient would lose benefits because of the work requirements he is proposing.
About 9 percent of SNAP recipients are ABAWDS. An estimated half of them work enough hours to avoid the 90-day limit.
At present, Republicans control the House 238-192, with five vacancies. A simple majority — roughly 218 votes in the full House — is required to pass legislation. If Democrats uniformly oppose a bill, Republicans must support it in near-unanimous numbers. That could pose problems, because a bloc of Tea Party-influenced Republicans often calls for spending cuts and opposes social programs.
SNAP costs about $70 billion a year and accounts for three-fourths of spending in the farm bill. The full-spectrum legislation also covers crop subsides, crop insurance, land stewardship, rural economic development, farm credit, specialty crops, overseas food aid, export promotion, agricultural research, forestry, and biofuel research.