House GOP leaders were facing heavy pressure from farm groups and their allies in Congress on Sunday to add economic assistance for row crop producers to a year-end stopgap spending bill.
The last-minute lobbying on the farm aid threatened to delay release of the legislative text until at least Monday. Lawmakers must pass a new continuing resolution by Friday to keep the government funded into 2025. It typically takes several days to move such a bill through Congress. The legislation also is expected to include a new one-year extension of the 2018 farm bill.
A series of major farm groups on Saturday called on Congress to reject any supplemental spending legislation that failed to include economic assistance for farmers.
Congressional leaders reached an impasse on the farm assistance when Democrats rejected the latest Republican proposal, which would provide $12 billion in market relief but do nothing about Inflation Reduction Act conservation funding, a key priority for Democrats.
As part of a deal on farm aid, Democrats on the House and Senate Ag committees want the package to move the IRA funding into the farm bill baseline and retain climate-related eligibility restrictions on money allocated through the Environmental Quality Incentives Program.
A Republican congressional source confirmed Sunday that the final text of the CR was likely delayed until Monday as congressional leaders tried to address the last-minute snag. “We have no resolution yet on economic assistance,” the source said.
Ted McKinney, CEO of the National Association of State Departments of Agriculture, on Sunday said in a statement that his group was calling on Congress to “put politics aside and find a resolution that provides the necessary economic aid and disaster assistance for the farmers and ranchers who work every day to provide food security to our country while also feeding the world.”
Bryan Baker, a cotton grower near Sudan, Texas, posted an appeal on X for congressional help. "We need Economic Assistance now. Many farmers and ag related businesses are in dire need of assistance due to increased input costs and lower prices," he wrote.
Some Republican lawmakers threatened to oppose the legislation unless it included the farm aid.
“I am distressed by the news that the planned government funding bill to reach the House floor this week will not include funding for our farmers and ranchers,” Rep. Pete Sessions, R-Texas, said in a post on X.
Some Republicans pointed the finger at Democrats.
“At a time when the American agriculture industry needs our support, Congress has let them down,” the chairman of the Congressional Western Caucus, Dan Newhouse, R-Wash., said in a statement. “This failure to help our farmers and ranchers is unacceptable.”
He said Stabenow and other Senate Democrats “should have come to the table sooner.”
Democrats blamed Republicans for he stalemate, In a statement Saturday, Stabenow and the top Democrat on the House Ag Committee, David Scott of Georgia, said the GOP's "eleventh-hour offer fell short of what farmers need."
Some conservation groups, meanwhile, appealed to GOP leaders to include the IRA funding in the aid package. “This bipartisan, paid-for provision would increase funding for oversubscribed, voluntary, locally led conservation programs," the National Association of Conservation Districts said in a statement Sunday.
Meanwhile this week, the House Democratic Steering and Policy Committee will select a ranking member for the House Ag Committee on Monday. Scott is being challenged for the position by Jim Costa of California and Angie Craig of Minnesota.
Rep. Greg Casar, a Texas Democrat who sits on the Ag Committee and was recently elected to chair the Congressional Progressive Caucus, told Agri-Pulse last week he urged his members “to pay close attention to issues of corporate power in the agriculture industry.
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“If candidates want our votes for ranking member, they should really pitch to Progressive Caucus members that they'll be willing to stand up to the big ag interests that have raised prices on consumers and hurt workers and farmers alike.”
When asked whether Scott’s absence from the Congressional Black Caucus event was a missed opportunity for Scott to make his pitch to members, Rep. Sanford Bishop, D-Ga., said “any opportunity that a candidate can have works to their advantage.”
Also this week, the Joint Economic Committee will have a hearing that’s aimed at warning about the potential economic impact of President-elect Donald Trump’s threats to impose higher tariffs on U.S. imports.
Jeff Ferry, chief economist for the Coalition for a Prosperous America, will make the case for higher tariffs at the hearing. He argues that a 10% across-the-board tariff on imports would raise enough revenue to provide a $1,200 tax refund to lower income households and refunds to higher earners worth 3% to 4% of their income.
Here is a list of agriculture- or rural-related events scheduled for this week in Washington and elsewhere (all times EDT):
Monday, Dec. 16
Tuesday, Dec. 17
Wednesday, Dec. 18
2:30 p.m. – Joint Economic Committee hearing, “Trade Wars & Higher Costs: The Case Against Trump’s Tariffs”
Thursday, Dec. 19
8:30 a.m. – USDA releases Weekly Export Sales report.
Friday, Dec. 20
9 a.m. – USDA releases monthly Food Price Outlook.
For more news, go to Agri-Pulse.com.
