13 Hours of Farm Bill Debate

13 Hours of Farm Bill Debate

Haylie Shipp
Haylie Shipp
Thirteen hours. It seems like a long time to talk about one topic, but if that’s what’s been holding us back on moving a farm bill forward, it’s pretty minuscule in comparison to the wait.

What am I talking about? Well, it took approximately 13 hours, but the House Agriculture Committee sent their version of the farm bill from Committee Chair GT Thompson to the full House for a vote. Joe Gilson, director of government affairs for the American Farm Bureau, says it was quite a process to get the bill out of committee…

“At the end of the day, they passed the bill out of committee with a bipartisan vote, and that means it moves to the House floor.”

Gilson says the American Farm Bureau is hoping to see the momentum continue…

“It’s up to the leadership in the House to see when they have time to bring the bill up. Obviously, it still has to go through the rules committee process, but it advances favorably with a bipartisan vote, and as American Farm Bureau, we're hoping House leaders can continue the momentum and bring this important legislation to a vote on the floor.”

He says the congressional calendar could pose a challenge to get the bill through the House…

“It’s a big election, and so we're going to have members of Congress back home early this fall, so it's a tight and crowded congressional calendar, but we're hoping this presents an opportunity for us to move a bipartisan bill.”

Learn more at fb.org/farmbill.

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