The United States Senate Agriculture Committee advanced a Republican-led farm bill on 16 September by 12 votes to 11, strictly along party lines, Farm Progress reports. It was the committee's second attempt after a failed vote in August, and it succeeded because Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky returned to cast the deciding vote. "He made a special effort to really get back this week in order to vote," committee chair John Boozman said.

Democrats opposed the bill over changes to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program due to take effect in fiscal 2028, under which states with payment error rates above 6% would pay part of the food benefits the federal government now covers, with the worst-performing states allowed to delay their penalties two years. The committee's bill pushes the provisions back to fiscal 2029; Democrats want another year's delay.

Senator Joni Ernst of Iowa made a last-minute attempt to add language barring state and local governments from regulating agricultural production methods, which would effectively void California's Proposition 12 on livestock housing. Boozman refused, saying he had closed the bill to amendments before the August vote, and Senator John Hoeven of North Dakota urged Ernst to raise Proposition 12 on the Senate floor instead. Ernst ultimately voted to advance the bill.

Farm groups pressed for quick passage. American Farm Bureau president Zippy Duvall said it had been almost a decade since Congress last passed a farm bill and that more than 200,000 family farms had gone out of business in the past ten years. Gregg Doud of the National Milk Producers Federation said the bill strengthens dairy provisions, and American Soybean Association president Scott Metzger called the vote an important step towards a five-year bill.

The bill now needs 60 votes in the full Senate, which will require compromise, and then reconciliation with the version already passed by the House. That may take time: House Speaker Mike Johnson announced on the same day that the House would recess for seven weeks, until after the midterm elections.

Source: Farm Progress