Thanks to speedy action by the Agriculture Committee, the Senate is on track to pass its five-year farm bill before the end of June, boosting the chances that the Republican-controlled Congress will enact the major legislation before election-year tensions stymie work later this year. Committee members approved the farm bill on Wednesday with just one major dispute — stricter eligibility rules for farm subsidies — looming for floor debate.
“I do think a 20-1 vote certainly indicates we have a solid, bipartisan majority,” said Agriculture chairman Pat Roberts, who worked with the senior Democrat on the committee, Debbie Stabenow, to draft a bill that would win broad support and easy passage in the Senate. To that end, they wrote an evolutionary bill that tweaks rather than overhauls the 2014 farm law. In particular, they did not change the structure of SNAP, in contrast to the decision by House Republicans to pursue welfare reform in the farm bill by requiring 7 million or more “work-capable” adults to work at least 20 hours a week or spend an equivalent amount of time in job training or workfare to qualify for food stamps. The decision backfired, and representatives defeated the farm bill on May 18.
While SNAP dominated farm bill debate in the House, the anti-hunger program was mentioned only four times during the two-and-a-half-hour Senate “mark up” of the farm bill, by one count, and there were no amendments to change the program.
“We will turn to the farm bill before the Fourth of July,” said Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, adding that he hoped the House “will get to theirs shortly, and we can make a law, which we all are interested in doing.” McConnell is a member of the Agriculture Committee but rarely appears at its meetings. He attended Wednesday’s meeting to applaud inclusion in the farm bill of his plan to legalize the production of industrial hemp.
The Senate is scheduled to leave June 29 for the Independence Day recess. House Republican leaders have until June 22 to revive their farm bill. The 2014 farm law expires on Sept. 30, although some provisions will remain in effect for months afterward.
Agriculture leaders have repeated a mantra of providing “certainty” and “predictability” to farmers by enacting the 2018 farm bill on time. “Commodity prices are low. We need to move this bill to help them,” said North Dakota Sen. John Hoeven. Since 1990, lawmakers have finished work on farm bills months later than planned. The 2014 law, for example, began as the 2012 farm bill. Roberts said the Senate might consider the farm bill as early as next week. “Could be. Hope so,” he said.
Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley, who wants farm payments focused on family-sized farms, said he will offer a payment limit amendment during the Senate debate. It would set a “hard” cap of $125,000 per person, per year for subsidies and limit the payments to farmers, their spouses, and one “manager” per farm. Grassley was prevented by a technicality from offering the amendment at the committee level and cast the only vote against the bill. The House and Senate adopted a similar provision for the 2104 farm law, but it was deleted from the final version of the bill.
“It’s just the opposite of the House. They’re taking all the limits off,” said Grassley. The House farm bill would make cousins, nieces, and nephews eligible for subsidies and remove payment limits from some types of corporate farms. The Roberts-Stabenow bill would deny payments to people with more than $700,000 in adjusted gross income. The current AGI limit is $900,000. Roberts declined to take a position on the Grassley amendment.
The National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition said it was “outrageous” that Grassley was not allowed to offer his amendment at the committee level. A half-dozen environmental and good-government groups have called for subsidy reforms in the farm bill.
If the Senate passes its bill with a large majority, it will be in a strong bargaining position with the House. “That bill is different. It will be a totally partisan bill. That is unfortunate,” said Roberts.
The Roberts-Stabenow bill would allow farmers a one-time choice between the insurance-like Agriculture Risk Coverage subsidy and the traditional Price Loss Coverage subsidy, increase the Conservation Reserve to 25 million acres from its current 24 million acres, and combine export-promotion programs into an umbrella grouping. The House bill would create a 29 million-acre Conservation Reserve, eliminate the green-payment Conservation Stewardship Program, and, like the Senate, combine export programs.
Senate committee members amended the Roberts-Stabenow bill to allow the use of USDA export development programs to build a market in Cuba for U.S. farm exports, to provide mandatory funding for USDA energy programs, and to reimburse $77 million to dairy farmers for the premiums they paid during the first three years of the Margin Protection Program, considered a failure of the 2014 farm law.
For a text of the bill or a section-by-section summary, click here.