Ag Policy Blog

If Republicans wanted to pass a bipartisan farm bill this year, they could.

Democrats could pass one, too -- but risk more hungry Americans as states implement stricter SNAP program eligibility that decreases enrollment and increases their share of administrative costs tied to error rates.

But the One Big Beautiful Bill (OBBB) may have made that much harder.

The OBBB settled major pieces of farm policy, including nearly $13.5 billion in additional Agriculture Risk Coverage-County (ARC-CO) and Price Loss Coverage (PLC) reference payments. Those payments will be delivered in October, along with tax cuts that benefited farmers.

At the same time, the law drove a deeper wedge between two issues that have always been politically connected: farm policy and food assistance.

Under the OBBB, states with SNAP payment error rates of 6% or higher will begin assuming a share of administrative costs that the federal government previously paid, starting in 2028.

On Aug. 6, the Senate Agriculture Committee's farm bill markup failed over this. Democrats held their line over a two-year extension of these error rate payments. There were not enough Republican votes to move the bill out of committee, with Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., absent for the final vote.

There is a path forward. Republicans could agree to delay implementation of the SNAP cost-sharing requirements without undoing them. Democrats could accept a farm bill that preserves the underlying changes while giving states more time to prepare.

But both sides have political reasons not to move.

For Republicans, the OBBB was supposed to be a major legislative victory. Changing its SNAP provisions could be portrayed as an admission that the law's reforms went too far -- or that Farm Bill 1.0 was structured incorrectly from the beginning.

Adding a two-year delay to the SNAP cost-sharing requirements would cost an estimated $19 billion, according to an amendment Sen. Ben Ray Lujan, D-N.M., offered last week. That is a difficult price tag to swallow after Republicans already used the OBBB to deliver major farm policy increases.

For Democrats, the issue is not simply whether to delay the cost-sharing requirement.

Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., argues the formula itself is unfair. States with the highest error rates, above 13.34%, receive additional time to comply, while states such as Minnesota, with an error rate near 9%, would begin paying sooner.

The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities -- a group that describes itself as nonpartisan but which some characterize as left-leaning -- estimates the law has resulted in 4 million fewer people receiving SNAP, including 1.5 million children. It's a hard, debatable -- but believable -- number to swallow. USDA data shows SNAP enrollment is already 5.3 million below last year's level.

The stakes are also high for states whose local budgets rely on property taxes too.

"Without this delay, counties would be forced to increase property taxes to cover the costs of administering the program, which most Minnesotans could not afford," Sen. Tina Smith, D-Minn., said, citing $140 million in costs over two years.

The Democratic argument, then, is that the OBBB changed more than the farm bill's price tag. It changed the balance between farm policy and food policy, which creates a problem for agriculture.

FARM WITHOUT FOOD DOES NOT PASS

It may not be written in commodity groups' policy books, but this farm bill cycle has made one rule increasingly clear: Farm without food does not pass.

If agriculture wants a farm bill, year-round E15, better USDA credit terms, mandatory country-of-origin labeling, rural development investments or other producer priorities, farmers and agricultural groups may have to fight for SNAP, too.

That is the uncomfortable consequence of the OBBB: A farm bill now needs Democratic support to move out of the Senate, while a midterm election could flip control of either chamber, making the political divide even harder to bridge.

Farm groups focused on commodities, cattle and ethanol now have a stake in SNAP because it stands between them and agricultural priorities closer to passage than ever.

Republicans have already moved toward the middle.

With the White House's blessing, Senate Republicans offered a one-year extension of the SNAP cost-sharing requirement, an additional choice of error-rate year and increased funding for The Emergency Food Assistance Program. The deal, struck between Sen. John Boozman, R-Ark., and American Farm Bureau Federation lobbyists, helped convince administration officials to offer the one-year extension.

Democrats did not accept the offer.

Many reporters, including myself, have pressed Boozman on why the White House isn't willing to offer more, particularly after he described the proposal as his "best and final offer." The White House, the final party who signed the OBBB, remains the final decision-maker.

Committee staff initially said, "Ask the White House yourself," attempting to separate the political blame. Later, they acknowledged that the GOP conference position should remain united.

The concern isn't necessarily the first two-year extension; it is what Democrats might ask for next.

"We give them two years, then they are going to come back and want two more," Boozman said.

It's a case of "If you give a mouse a cookie, he's going to ask for a glass of milk."

Some farm organizations, however, may be willing to offer that cookie if it gets their priorities across the finish line.

Two agriculture lobbyists who spoke with DTN indicated they might be interested in pressuring Republicans and the White House for a two-year delay, potentially countering Republicans' anti-Democrat media strategy.

In other words, some farm groups may be willing to fight for SNAP not because it has traditionally been their issue, but because they now need Democrats to hold the line on SNAP to get their own farm policy priorities across the finish line.

THE SEPTEMBER TEST

That calculation could change after senators spend the next month hearing from voters and constituents at home.

Democrats could return in September with a position closer to the GOP's. Republicans could find more room to compromise. Or both sides could return to the same lines that produced last week's 10-11 vote.

The markup is expected to resume Tuesday, Sept. 15. If McConnell returns, the bill should have enough votes to leave committee. But that solves only the first problem.

The bill still needs 60 votes on the Senate floor. There are 53 Republicans, 45 Democrats and two independents.

Democrats also have a difficult calculation. If they vote against the bill and defeat it, the one-year SNAP extension disappears along with the rest of the farm bill. Republicans have a calculation of their own: How much are they willing to change a law they just passed to get a farm bill they already wanted?

That is the trap the OBBB created.

THE HUMAN COST

Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins said at Minnesota Farmfest last week, "For those of us who love work and celebrate work and want people to work and not be on food stamps, it's a pretty big win when we move 5 million people off of food stamps."

But there is a human cost behind those numbers.

Massachusetts-based public radio station WBUR reported on Lee Rosen, a 69-year-old Phoenix man among roughly 460,000 Arizonans who lost SNAP benefits. Unable to work, he has struggled to reach the state agency for help. Arizona also cut hundreds of Department of Economic Security jobs, leaving applicants and people appealing benefit decisions facing jammed phone lines and long waits.

The farm bill exists because farm and food interests are supposed to coexist. The OBBB disrupted that balance, delivering significant farm policy wins alongside severe SNAP cuts. On the Aug. 6 markup, the hearing showed those two pieces could not remain separate.

The OBBB may have delivered Farm Bill 1.0. It may also have killed Farm Bill 2.0.

Agriculture now faces a choice: Do they want a farm bill, or do they want to preserve the SNAP cost-share provisions that could stand in its way?

Jake Zajkowski can be reached at jake.zajkowski@dtn.com

Follow him on social platform X @jzajkow

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