🔵 Portal: Farm bill follies

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What’s next for the farm bill?

Happy Wednesday morning.

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The farm bill has had a bumpy road. Here’s the latest.

House Republicans clashed over several farm bill provisions as the House devolved into chaos on Monday. Farm-state Republicans demanded a provision allowing the year-round sale of the E15 ethanol fuel blend, which oil state members have typically opposed.

The farm-state lawmakers got their way. The rule now includes a provision, which the CBO said would increase the deficits by billions over the next 10 years, that would add the E15 language to the farm bill. But conservative hardliners still oppose this measure. Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) told us this E15 provision is “garbage.”

The House will vote on the rule sometime Wednesday. It will likely be close.

GOP members also agreed to allow an amendment vote to strip controversial pesticide language opposed by Democrats, MAHA advocates and Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.) from the farm bill. The language would not allow states to require pesticide manufacturers to label their packaging differently from what the EPA allows. Critics of the language argue it undercuts state efforts to issue stronger warnings about the health risks posed by a pesticide.

What happens in the House on Wednesday and Thursday will determine the farm bill’s fate in the Senate. Senate Agriculture Committee Chair John Boozman (R-Ark.) said his goal is to advance legislation that can get 60 votes in the Senate and is hoping the House bill can attract some Democratic support.

“If it comes out partisan, then that’ll be difficult to do,” Boozman told us.

Senate funding talks. While the House Appropriations Committee charges forward with FY2027 markups, Senators are taking a slower approach.

Senate appropriators said they haven’t had many bipartisan conversations yet about subcommittee allocations, which are needed to start markups. Senators noted they’ve focused on budget hearings, which are ongoing. VA Secretary Doug Collins will testify to the spending panel on Thursday.

The Senate typically advances bipartisan funding bills, while the House funding panel passes partisan ones. House Republican appropriators have approved subcommittee allocations for half of the FY2027 bills, mostly below FY2026 funding levels. While senators expect their bills to be above the House GOP levels, they say they’re not ready to make any agreements.

Sen. Deb Fischer (R-Neb.), the chair of the Legislative Branch Subcommittee, said she and Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.), the panel’s ranking member, haven’t had any conversations about their allocation. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (N.H.), the top Democrat on the Agriculture funding panel, said the same.

“We don’t have an allocation yet, but we’re moving forward,” said Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.), the top Senate Republican for the Labor-HHS bill. “I’d like to see us be able to repeat these successes we had last year. So I’m ever hopeful.”

Senate Appropriations Committee Chair Susan Collins (R-Maine) is aiming to start markups early this summer.

House approps update. Speaking of the House markups, the House Appropriations Committee advanced the FY2027 National Security-State funding bill on a party-line vote Tuesday evening.

House appropriators continued the trend of adopting an amendment that would withhold funding to the administrative offices of cabinet officials who don’t testify before the spending panels. The panel approved a measure by voice vote that would withhold 25% of Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s budget for the office of the secretary until he testifies. The panel adopted a similar amendment for Collins’ Department of Veterans Affairs budget.

– Samantha Handler

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It’s been quite the week on the Hill so far. There is chaos in the House, a visit from King Charles III and yet another state with a new congressional map.

Money matters. Let’s talk about the new Florida map. Our campaign gurus Ally Mutnick and Max Cohen have been following the issue very closely. One thing that stuck out to us in their recent reporting is that four House Democrats could be competing for three seats under the plan unveiled by GOP Gov. Ron DeSantis. To be sure… the map will be challenged in court.

We thought it would be a good time to fire up our new campaign finance tracker to see what type of money these four lawmakers have as they prepare to potentially battle each other. We’ll break it down by what they raised in the first quarter and how much cash they have on hand. But click on the link to dive deep into their finances. The four lawmakers:

— Rep. Frederica Wilson: $23,469.64 | $390,206.66

— Rep. Lois Frankel: $415,779.79 | $1,464,968.60

— Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz: $717,324.03 | $2,507,480.19

— Rep. Jared Moskowitz: $429,235.43 | $1,217,063.57

Legislative intelligence. The visit to Congress this week by the king put us in a British state of mind. So after chowing down on some shepherd’s pie, we asked Enbloc AI to revisit the vote last year to confirm Warren Stephens as ambassador to the United Kingdom.

Go to Enbloc AI for the answer.

— Dave Clarke