Iowa farmers face another farm bill delay after the U.S. Senate Agriculture Committee failed to move forward its version of the omnibus legislation due to a conflict over when states will shoulder a share of federal nutrition assistance costs.
Snap Error Rate Extension
The bill included bipartisan language from more than 100 bills, but Democrats were unwilling to budge on their demand for a two-year extension to the One Big Beautiful Bill Act policy that requires states to pay for part of their Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) if they have SNAP payment error rates in excess of 6%.
Chairman John Boozman amended the bill to extend the deadline one year, as a compromise, along with additional funding for an emergency food assistance program. Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, said in the seven farm bills that he has worked on, “this is the first one I can recall that we’re not doing on a bipartisan basis.”
Farm Bill Considerations
The bill also stipulates the policies that farmers rely on for things like indemnity payments, or conservation work, marketing assistance, disaster payments and support for rural development. Farm states and agriculture commodity groups have pushed for many years for year-round, nationwide E15 legislation, since the added ethanol demand would boost corn demand.
Original reporting: KCCI Des Moines — read the source article.
