The House Agriculture Committee pointed to spending cuts enacted as part of the 2014 farm law, and asked the Budget Committee to look to the other 98 percent of the federal budget for savings. “From our perspective, we believe the Committee on Agriculture has done its part for now with respect to deficit reduction,” says a letter approved on a voice vote by committee members. The farm law called for $23 billion in savings and the committee says the savings “remain intact.” Chairman Mike Conaway said the downturn in commodity prices was another reason to forgo cuts at USDA. “We are the one committee that stepped up to the plate and reduced the deficit last year,” said Collin Peterson, the Democratic leader on the panel.
The “budget view and estimates” letter is an annual exercise at the start of the congressional budget-writing season. With interest high among majority-party Republicans to rein in spending, there is a possibility the Budget Committee will call for cuts in mandatory spending programs, which include crop insurance and food stamps.
“Recent calls for cuts to crop insurance are especially ill-timed and unwise,” says the committee letter. It said savings from public nutrition programs were “more than anticipated during the farm bill debate. This will not alter the committee’s intention to conduct a top-to-bottom review of SNAP (food stamps) which accounts for 80 percent of all farm bill expenditures nor will it change our plans for intensive oversight with respect to all other policies within our jurisdiction.”