With the new farm bill months overdue, Senate Agriculture Committee chair Debbie Stabenow proposed a farm bill on Wednesday that would boost so-called reference prices — a roadblock issue — while rejecting the $28 billion cut in SNAP sought by conservative Republicans. “That is a hard red line for me,” Stabenow told reporters.
Meanwhile, Glenn Thompson of Pennsylvania, chair of the House Agriculture Committee, announced that it will vote May 23 on a package that includes the SNAP cuts and would use climate funding for all sorts of stewardship practices, not just for climate mitigation. “I hope for unanimous support in this endeavor to bring stability to producers, protect our nation’s food security, and revitalize rural America,” said Thompson, who released a five-page summary of his plan.
“By insisting on poison pill policies, Republicans have turned what could have been a genuinely bipartisan bill into a messaging exercise to appease their right flank that has no chance of becoming law,” said Georgia Rep. David Scott, the senior Democrat on the House committee.
The “four corners” of the farm bill — Stabenow, Thompson, Scott, and Arkansas Sen. John Boozman — have been at an impasse for months over higher crop subsidies, SNAP funding, and climate mitigation. Stabenow said she proposed the full-scale farm bill in hopes of jump-starting talks. “If folks want a farm bill, let’s get serious,” she said. “We need serious negotiations on areas of disagreement.”
“I’m optimistic that real progress on the farm bill can occur in this Congress,” said Boozman, the senior Republican on the Senate Agriculture Committee and a leading proponent of higher reference prices. Boozman said Senate Republicans would release a farm bill “framework” after the House Agriculture Committee’s farm bill vote.
Stabenow said her bill would increase reference prices by at least 5 percent for major commodities, making it easier to trigger crop subsidy payments. Cotton, rice, and peanuts would be the crops most likely to benefit, she said. Some commodities would see increases of 10 to 15 percent because of an escalator provision in the 2018 farm law that automatically raises reference prices when there is a multiyear run of high market prices.
In his summary, Thompson said he would “increase support” for USDA crop subsidy programs “to account for persistent inflation and rising costs of production.”
“We’re encouraged to see both proposals acknowledge that programs farmers and ranchers across the country use require additional investment in the face of falling commodity prices and increased inflation,” said the American Farm Bureau Federation. “Details are important, however, and there is a lot of work to do.”
Republicans in the House and Senate, including Thompson and Boozman, want to eliminate the USDA’s power to adjust SNAP benefits when it reviews the cost of a healthy diet every five years. In a 2021 review, the Biden administration increased benefits by $250 billion over 10 years. It’s estimated that the Republican proposal for budget-neutral reviews would save $28 billion over 10 years, a relatively small amount. Nonetheless, it has become a test point for conservatives who want to reduce the cost of public nutrition programs and Democrats who say SNAP helps millions of people get enough to eat.
“Taking money out of nutrition has never passed a farm bill,” said Stabenow.
The five-page summary of Thompson’s plan is available here.
A seven-page summary of Stabenow’s bill is available here.
A 94-page section-by-section description of the Stabenow bill is available here.