Senate Takes Up Budget Reconciliation Bill
SNAP slashed and Big Farm Subsidies Upped – similar to House
The gears are grinding forward toward a final Budget Reconciliation package that would decimate the SNAP program and push millions of Americans closer to hunger while increasing subsidy payments to larger scale commodity crop farmers and leaving smaller diversified farms behind. In developing its own bill, the Senate mostly followed the lead of the House; the SNAP cut and subsidy increase were not quite as big, but still highly destructive.
One small win in the Senate version is that it removed a provision from the House version that would have made it even more unlikely that Congress would push for completion of a new Farm Bill. However, a unified voice of opposition to the Budget Reconciliation bill remains high priority.
No doubt, both Senator Mark Warner and Senator Tim Kaine, both strong advocates for food security and for local food systems linked with diversified organic and sustainable farms, will be opposed to this bill. We can call them to thank them for their opposition and encourage them to take a strong public stand and speak out against the proposed SNAP cuts. Call Senator Warner at 202-224-2023 and Senator Kaine at 202-224-4024.
2026 Agricultural Appropriations
The House is done, Senate action is next
The House Appropriations Committee finished marking up their proposal for Fiscal Year 2026 and it hurts farmers, the land, and all of us in several ways. It zeroes-out the Office of Urban Agriculture and Innovative Production (OUAIP, which has funded some excellent projects over the last few years) and the Grazing Lands Conservation Initiative (GLCI, which provides technical assistance in regenerative grazing practices for livestock producers). It makes significant cuts to the Value Added Producer Grants (VAPG) and the SARE program, and trims about 8% from the NRCS budget for technical assistance.
As the Senate takes up this bill, advocates are contacting members of the Senate Agriculture Appropriations Subcommittee to urge them to support full funding for all of these programs. While neither of our Senators serves on this committee, we can call them and ask them to push their colleagues on that committee to restore discretionary funding to the full authorized levels for SARE, VAPG, GLCI, OUAIP, and conservation technical assistance.
202? Farm Bill
I have no information to share at this time regarding the future of the Farm Bill, except that advocates continue to work hard to get Congressional agriculture committees to write a new Farm Bill as soon as practical – and it must be a farm bill that promotes truly regenerative, equitable, and climate smart agriculture and food systems. I will keep you posted.
Other NSAC news
Check out the NSAC blog post on the value of the farmer-led SARE program, whose funding is currently threatened with a 20% cut in appropriations.
To keep up with other National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition news, visit their website home page and look around – or visit their action page for current grassroots action alerts.
