What's In and What's Out of the House Republican Farm Bill Draft.
The Cocklebur's Laundry List of potential Farm Bill edits, amendments, arguments, and controversies during the legislative debate.
(This article was co-written by friend of The Cocklebur, Jake Davis.)
When the House Agriculture Committee gavels in their markup of Chair Glenn Thompson’s draft “Farm, Food, and National Security Act of 2024” at 11am today (May 23rd), the long-overdue re-authorization of the 2018 Farm Bill will be off and running.
The core debate—and the biggest budget movers in the legislative package estimated to cost $1.5 trillion over the next decade—are Republican proposals to increase farm subsidies by raising “reference prices” and expanding crop insurance while cutting nutrition programs like SNAP (the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program formerly known as “food stamps”).
House Republicans are likely to fall in line on SNAP cuts, but some GOP politicians might balk at the more than $50 billion budget hit to increase government support for farmers. Democratic leaders, on the other hand, have drawn red lines on SNAP cuts. Many Democrats might support farm subsidy changes, though, as long as there is a legitimate way to pay for them.
There are numerous other critical issues in play during the Farm Bill debate. Many Tribal and Indigenous policy priorities are not a key feature of the House draft. The Forestry Title is being criticized by forest conservation groups for promoting more aggressive timber harvest in National Forests, along with undermining the National Environmental Policy Act and Endangered Species Act. Farm credit programs in the House draft do not fully address the credit needs of thousands of struggling farmers, especially “socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers,” the USDA terms for BIPOC farmers. The draft limits the Environmental Protection Agency’s ability to regulate pesticides.
In addition to these topics, The Cocklebur believes that the following issues, controversies, conflicts, disagreements, and/or amendments are likely to be discussed during the coming legislative process:
Controversial Provisions in the Thompson Draft:
The Eats Act—the Ending Agricultural Trade Suppression (EATS) Act, (S.2019 and H.R.4417), introduced by Sen. Roger Marshall (R-KS) and Rep. Ashley Hinson (R-IA), would take away state and local government authority to enact agricultural policies within their own state borders. This attack on local control and democracy is part of a long-term corporate agribusiness campaign seeking to disallow state and county governments from passing ordinances or regulations “stricter than federal law.” The EATS Act was offered by supporters of factory farm livestock operations in the face of California rules on animal welfare and the humane treatment of livestock.
Climate Guardrails in Conservation Programs—the House draft rescinds Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) conservation program spending designed to increase farmer adoption of “climate friendly” agricultural practices. The bill reallocates funds to voluntary conservation programs more broadly, removing the original IRA climate guardrails from conservation program participation.
CCC (Commodity Credit Corporation) Authority Reform—under current law, the Secretary of Agriculture has a $30 billion authority under the Commodity Credit Corporation to pay for U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) programs outside of the regular Congressional budget and Farm Bill process. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack used the CCC authority to create his “Climate Smart Commodities” program. Vilsack’s predecessor, Sonny Perdue, spent billions of CCC funds on large agricultural subsidy payments in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The Thompson bill seeks to narrow CCC authority to focus on commodity farm programs.
Changes to the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP)—the House draft reduces CRP’s ability to address specific environmental concerns such as water pollution prevention. Instead, Thompson’s bill would focus on soil classification, which is likely to shift CRP enrollment away from some states that have used targeted environmental criteria for positive outcomes.
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Some Proposed Farm Bill Reforms Not Included in the Thompson Draft:
Mandatory Country-of-Original Labeling (COOL) for beef—the Thompson draft does not include the popular restoration of mandatory labeling for imported beef. A large, diverse coalition of farmers, ranchers, and consumer advocates is supporting inclusion of the American Beef Labeling Act in the Farm Bill to restore mandatory COOL.
Checkoff Reform—the House Republican draft does not include reforms to commodity checkoff programs. Checkoffs are mandatory fees collected when farmers sell crops, livestock or other commodities. “Many family farm groups have long sought to terminate or reform checkoffs, pointing to program abuses and corruption. Millions of checkoff dollars support the agribusiness industry and trade association front groups with a corporate agenda,” as we wrote in our Barn Raiser Farm Bill Column on the topic. Look for the Opportunities for Fairness in Farming Act (OFF Act) to be offered as an amendment in either the House or Senate as the Farm Bill debate moves forward.
Factory Farm Livestock—the current House draft does nothing to curb out-of-control growth of industrial livestock factories, nor prevent factory farms from drawing down large chunks of voluntary conservation cost-share dollars.
Packers and Stockyards Act—Thompson’s draft does not include any resources for enforcement of the Packers and Stockyards Act (P&S Act) of 1921. The P&S Act was historically used to increase competition in livestock markets by holding meatpackers and livestock traders accountable for farmer-exploiting market practices and corruption. Restoring P&S Act authority and resources is a bedrock demand sought by many family farm and Farm Bill reform groups.
Summing Up the House Republican Farm Bill Draft.
Edna Rodriguez, Executive Director of RAFI, summed up the broad strokes of the Thompson House draft succinctly:
“The Farm, Food, and National Security Act hurts the many to favor the few. The bill’s cuts to SNAP will have harmful ripple effects through multiple important nutrition sub-programs, including the Nutrition Assistance Program (NAP) in Puerto Rico, and The Emergency Food Assistance Program (TEFAP) which, among other things, funds Farm to Food Bank projects that open up new market channels for farmers. This is all in service of increases to commodity subsidies that we know drive farm consolidation and thus contribute to small and mid-scale farm losses. When combined with the bill’s total lack of attention to corporate concentration within the food and agriculture space, the result is a Farm Bill designed to build corporate profits, not resilient and just food systems.”
The biggest challenge to passing a Farm Bill remains a bipartisan budget deal that caps federal farm and food spending. The Farm Bill negotiation process will continue throughout this election year. The current bill expires on September 30th, 2024. Decisions made by legislators through the markup and amendment process in the Agriculture Committees and on the full floor of the House and Senate will determine who benefits most from the Farm Bill for the next five years.
The Cocklebur covers rural policy and politics from a progressive point-of-view. Our work focuses on a tangled rural political reality of dishonest debate, economic and racial disparities, corporate power over our democracy, and disinformation peddled by conservative media outlets. We aim to use facts, data, and science to inform our point-of-view. We wear our complicated love/WTF relationship with rural America on our sleeve.