Senate Agriculture Chair John Boozman (R-Ark.) is planning to hold another committee vote on his farm bill plans next week, in a new attempt to squeeze the farmer-friendly policies through to the full chamber ahead of November’s midterms.
The panel first met in early August to debate and vote on the GOP-led package. But the legislation stalled due to opposition from committee Democrats and the continued absence of Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) from the Capitol.
Boozman hasn’t set a firm date for a committee meeting next week, he told POLITICO on Thursday. He recessed the committee before the Senate’s summer break so he could call them back for another vote without a lengthy amendment and debate process.
“I really feel like it’s important to continue to have members express where they’re at on this, and so we are going to vote again next week,” Boozman said.
McConnell, who had been in the hospital since June and returned home for rehab in August, is hoping to be present in committee to vote for the package “if it’s humanly possible,” Boozman said.
“I haven’t talked to him personally since the markup, but I know my staff has been communicating with his staff,” Boozman said.
“It seems like Sen. McConnell is continuing to recover and doing well. So hopefully, we’ll get him back. We don’t have any assurance of that, but we do have the assurance that he is doing better,” he said.
Boozman said he will still call for next week’s vote regardless of whether McConnell is well enough to attend — potentially leaving the fate of the chamber’s farm bill again in Democrats’ hands.
Democrats voted against the package in August due to ongoing frustration over the GOP’s massive spending cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.
Their top demand is for Republicans to give all states two extra years before the onset of a new requirement that will require state governments to pay for part of SNAP benefits. Such a delay would put all states on the same timeline as a group of states with the highest rates of erroneous SNAP benefit payments, which were given a carve-out in the GOP’s policy megabill passed last summer.
Boozman’s bill includes a one-year delay of the cost-share implementation. He told POLITICO that offer is still his best, and final, one to Democrats.
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