From the Food Research and Action Center (http://www.frac.org):
As you know, the current farm bill expired on September 30 (although SNAP is still going because funding was already provided for the program). Agriculture Committee leaders in the House and Senate have been working since July to resolve differences between their two versions of the farm bill. The Senate farm bill protects and strengthens SNAP, while the House farm bill would take away food assistance from more than 2 million Americans. Our goal remains the same: to ensure that the final farm bill is based on the Senate’s SNAP provisions.
If the House and Senate don’t agree on a final farm bill by the end of 2018, then they will have to restart the legislative process in the new Congress in 2019 (beginning with introducing a farm bill proposal in both the House and Senate Agriculture Committees). Because starting over is a lot of work, and because of some time-sensitive issues for non-SNAP policies in the farm bill, there is pressure for members to get the farm bill done in the lame duck session. We know House and Senate Agriculture leaders continue to meet to see if they can work out a deal in the next few weeks — but we and others feel strongly that the most important thing is not when the farm bill gets done but how. A farm bill that takes away food assistance from people in need and cuts SNAP significantly is unacceptable.
TAKE ACTION: Please email or call your senators’ and representative’s offices to put the farm bill back on their radar with the Senate’s SNAP provisions. Find their contact information:
- Senator Robert Casey: http://casey.senate.gov
- Senator Pat Toomey: http://toomey.senate.gov
- Your Representative: http://www.house.gov
Reiterate to them why the final farm bill needs to be based on the Senate’s SNAP provisions (you can use these talking points), and ask your members to work with their party leadership to ensure this outcome.
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