President Donald Trump on Dec. 20 signed the 2018 Farm Bill into law, but not without some 11th hour drama that included the release of a USDA plan to strengthen work rules for food stamp recipients through the regulatory process.
The five-year, $867 billion farm bill, known as the Agriculture Improvement Act of 2018, was passed by both chambers last week (GM Dec. 14, p. 1) with only limited changes to work rules required under the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). The House version of the bill had included tougher work requirements for SNAP recipients, but the compromise bill opted instead to keep provisions that allow governors to sign off on work requirement waivers in areas of high unemployment.
Just hours before the bill’s signing, however, USDA released a plan that would eliminate statewide waivers from work requirements for SNAP recipients unless a state qualifies for extended unemployment benefits, Bloomberg reported. USDA Secretary Sonny Perdue told reporters during a press call that he believes the administration “can make improvements to SNAP through the regulatory process.”
House Agriculture Chairman Mike Conaway (R-Texas) said the USDA action works in tandem with the new farm bill. “I applaud the proposed rule and proudly stand with the Trump administration in demonstrating the importance of state accountability and recipient success,” Conaway said in a statement.
Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.), who serves on the Senate Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry Committee, said the administration’s action defies the farm bill, however, and will likely face legal challenges.
“Congress writes laws and the administration is required to write rules based on the law, not the other way around,” Stabenow said in a statement. “Congress chose not to change the current SNAP work rules in the Farm Bill, and instead, focused on strengthening work programs that actually help people get jobs.”
The bill’s signing also took place under the threat of a looming government shutdown, which was set to start at the end of Dec. 21 unless Congress and Trump set aside their feud over border wall funding and reach a short-term deal to extend funding for major federal agencies.
Despite these uncertainties, the farm bill signing was applauded by the National Corn Growers Association (NCGA) and a number of trade associations representing the crop insurance industry. Among the bill’s key provisions, commodity support programs and crop insurance provisions are reauthorized mostly in their current form, although with some changes to how benefits are calculated.
“NCGA is very pleased that our farmers will be able to look forward to a new year with the certainty of a new farm bill,” said NCGA President Lynn Chrisp. “Between depressed commodity prices, record low farm incomes, and tariffs and trade uncertainty, today’s signing is very welcome news.”
“It’s been a difficult year for farmers and ranchers from coast to coast, but rural America is ending 2018 on a high note with this farm bill,” said a joint statement from the American Association of Crop Insurers, Crop Insurance and Reinsurance Bureau, Crop Insurance Professionals Association, Independent Insurance Agents and Brokers of America, National Association of Professional Insurance Agents, and National Crop Insurance Services. “The new law keeps crop insurance affordable and widely available for agriculture, and it provides much-needed certainty heading into 2019.”
The insurance associations said farmers spend $3.5-$4 billion annually on approximately 1.1 million crop insurance policies, which provided $106 billion in claims this year on more than 130 different crops covering 311 million acres.