The Senate next week will begin work on farm bill that doesn’t include language bolstering work requirements for food stamp recipients that Republicans were pursuing in a stalled House version of the bill.
The Senate bill is a bipartisan measure authored by Senate Agriculture Committee Chairman Pat Roberts, R-Kan., and the panel’s top Democrat, Debbie Stabenow, D-Mich.
Roberts has said he is interested in reforming the food stamp program, but that would cost Democratic support, which is needed to prevent a filibuster in the Senate.
The House is also hoping to take up its version of the farm bill this month, House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., said Friday. But the bill is hung up on a side issue — the conservatives who are needed to pass the measure say they’ll hold back support until the leadership grants a vote on immigration reform, which is currently under negotiation.
Democrats are unilaterally opposed to the House bill because of the language bolstering work requirements for many able-bodied food stamp recipients.
The Senate bill authorizes farm policy and programs until 2023, including crop insurance, conservation and subsidy programs. Roberts and Stabenow issued a joint statement backing the bill.
“It has been more than a year of traveling across the country listening to farmers, ranchers, rural communities, and those in need,” they said. “Now the time has come to put what we’ve learned into a bipartisan bill that will provide much-needed certainty for agriculture, families, and rural America.”
The committee will vote to advance the bill next week and Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., plans to hold a Senate floor vote soon, he said last week.
McConnell announced Friday that the farm bill includes a provision to legalize hemp production, which is an important crop in his home state of Kentucky.
McConnell and lawmakers from other hemp-producing states have been pushing to legalize hemp, which is used in many products and does not include the chemical THC found in marijuana.
“Hemp has proven itself as a job-creating growth industry with far-reaching economic potential. It’s just common sense that farmers in Oregon and across our country should be allowed to cultivate this cash crop,” said Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore.
