A farmer stores grain near Eldridge, Iowa, on Sept. 28, 2024. (Kathie Obradovich | Iowa Capital Dispatch)

WASHINGTON — Sweeping legislation that would set food and farm policy for the next five years is in limbo, waiting for lawmakers to decide its fate after the election.

The latest deadline for the farm bill passed unceremoniously at midnight on Sept. 30, without a push from lawmakers to pass a new farm bill or an extension.

Congress will have to scramble in the lame-duck session set to begin Nov. 12 to come up with some agreement on the farm bill before benefits run out at the end of the year — which if allowed to happen eventually would have major consequences.

The law began 90 years ago with various payments to support farmers but now has an impact far beyond the farm, with programs to create wildlife habitat, address climate change and provide the nation’s largest federal nutrition program.

Ag coalition in disarray

The omnibus farm bill is more than a year behind schedule, as the bipartisan congressional coalition that has advanced farm bills for the last half century has been teetering on the edge of collapse.

Congress must approve a new federal farm bill every five years. The previous farm bill from 2018 expired a year ago. With no agreement in sight at the time, lawmakers extended the law to Sept. 30, 2024.

The delay creates further uncertainty for farmers, who are facing declining prices for many crops and rising costs for fertilizer and other inputs.

Lawmakers have some buffer before Americans feel the consequences of the expiration.

Most of the key programs have funding through the end of the calendar year, but once a new crop year comes into place in January, they would revert to “permanent law,” sending crop supports back to policy from the 1938 and 1949 farm bills.

Those policies are inconsistent with modern farming practices and international trade agreements and could cost the federal government billions, according to a recent analysis from the non-partisan Congressional Research Service.

‘Groundhog Day’ cited by Vilsack

The stalemate between Democrats and Republicans over the farm bill has centered on how to pay for it and whether to place limits on nutrition and climate programs.

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack told reporters in a press call on Saturday that the process “feels like Groundhog Day” — because he keeps having the same conversations about it. Vilsack said Republicans “just don’t have the votes” on the floor for legislation passed in the House Agriculture Committee, which is why it has sat dormant in the House for four months.

“If they want to pass the farm bill they’ve got to get practical, and they either have to lower their expectations or raise resources. And if they’re going to raise resources, they have to do it in a way where they don’t lose votes, where they actually gain votes,” Vilsack, a former Iowa governor, said.

The Republican-led committee approved its farm bill proposal largely on party lines at the end of May, amidst complaints from Democrats that the process had not been as bipartisan as in years past.

Partisan division is not uncommon in today’s Congress but is notable on the farm bill, which historically brought together lawmakers from both sides of the aisle. Bipartisan support can be necessary for final passage because the size of the $1.5 trillion farm bill means it inevitably loses some votes from fiscal conservatives and others.

Shutdown threat  

Lawmakers are on borrowed time with both the farm bill and the appropriations bills that fund the federal government.

The House and Senate both approved stopgap spending bills at the end of September to avoid a partial government shutdown. The short-term funding bill, sometimes referred to as a continuing resolution, or CR, will keep the federal government running through Dec. 20.

Some agriculture leaders had asked for the continuing resolution to not extend the farm bill, to help push the deadline for them to work on it when they return.

The day after they approved the CR and left the Capitol, 140 Republican House members sent a letter to congressional leadership asking to make the farm bill a priority in the waning weeks of 2024.

“Farmers and ranchers do not have the luxury of waiting until next Congress for the enactment of an effective farm bill,” the letter states, noting rising production costs and falling commodity prices that have put farmers in a tight spot.

House Democrats also say they want to pass a new farm bill this year.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, a New York Democrat, listed the farm bill as one of his top three priorities for the lame duck. Also on his list were appropriations and the National Defense Authorization Act, which sets policy for the Pentagon.

“It will be important to see if we can find a path forward and reauthorize the farm bill in order to make sure that we can meet the needs of farmers, meet the needs from a nutritional standpoint of everyday Americans and also continue the progress we have been able to make in terms of combating climate crisis,” Jeffries said in remarks to reporters Sept. 25.

Nearly 300 members of the National Farmers Union visited lawmakers in September to ask for passage of a new five-year farm bill before the end of 2024.

“Family farmers and ranchers can’t wait – they need the certainty of a new farm bill this year,” National Farmers Union President Rob Larew said in a statement after the meetings. “With net farm income projected at historic lows, growing concentration in the agriculture sector, high input costs and interest rates, and more frequent and devastating natural disasters, Congress can’t miss this opportunity to pass a five-year farm bill.”

Disagreements over SNAP formula

The key dispute for Democrats this year is a funding calculation that would place limits on the “Thrifty Food Plan” formula that calculates benefits for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, SNAP.

It would keep SNAP payments at current levels but place a permanent freeze on the ability of future presidents to raise levels of food support. Democrats have characterized it as a sneaky cut to vital support for hungry Americans that makes the bill dead on arrival.

Republicans are using the limits as part of a funding calculation to offset other spending in the bill. The bill would raise price supports for some crops like cotton, peanuts and rice.

“They have to do one of two things,” Vilsack said of lawmakers. “They either have to recognize that they can’t afford all the things that they would like to be able to afford, if they want to stay within the resources that are in fact available … Or another alternative would be to find more money.”

Vilsack recommended finding other sources of funding outside the farm bill, like changes to the tax code.

“You close a loophole here or there in terms of the taxes or whatever, and you generate more revenue, and you have that revenue directly offset the increase in the farm bill. … That’s the correct way to do it. And that’s, frankly, the way Senator Stabenow is approaching the farm bill,” Vilsack said, referring to Senate Agriculture Committee Chairwoman Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich).

The Senate Agriculture Committee has had no public markup or formal introduction of a bill. But leaders say committee staff have been meeting weekly to discuss a path forward. Stabenow has not publicly disclosed the offsets for the money she says is available to be moved into the bill.

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