Johnson: South Dakota sees wins with latest farm bill markup

The Memorial Day holiday usually begins the election-year countdown sprint where partisan politics typically overshadow serious legislation. But for Republicans in the House, last week ended with a victory: After more than 13 hours of markup last Thursday, the House Agriculture Committee passed their version of the farm bill.

Known as HR 8467, the Farm, Food and National Security Act of 2024 is a 900-plus-page draft collection of ag-related authorizations from crop insurance to rural development projects and nutrition assistance. The omnibus, multi-year piece of legislation is rehashed every five years; the U.S. has passed 18 farm bills since the 1930s. The latest version was passed in 2018 and expired last September; the programs which operate under the farm bill are currently on an extension until Sept. 30.

The draft version passed out of House Ag totals $1.5 trillion — the first farm bill in U.S. history to break the trillion-dollar barrier. It passed out of committee May 23 by a vote of 33-to-21 with the help of four Democrats.

South Dakota's lone congressman, Republican Dusty Johnson, sits on the House Agriculture Committee and told the Journal this week getting a farm bill out of committee on a bipartisan vote had to be the goal.

"We know that we're in the era of divided government," Johnson said. "This farm bill has got a lot of wins for rural America, which is why I think it was passed so strongly out of committee."

The standout point of contention surrounding the latest farm bill draft is the discussion around potential cuts to food assistance for needy families.

Formerly known as food stamps, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits more than 41 million Americans — roughly 12.5% of the U.S. population, according to the Pew Research Center. To qualify, households must have a gross monthly income at or below 130% of the federal poverty level and a net income at or below 100% of the federal poverty level. People 60 or older or with disabilities need only meet the net requirement, and those on other forms of federal assistance like Temporary Assistance for Needy Families or Supplemental Social Security Income often qualify automatically.

A family of four in 2023 would qualify with $3,007 in gross monthly income and $2,313 in net monthly income.

In April 2023, the national average benefit was $181.72 per person and $343.00 per household per month. The amount an individual or household can receive is established by the Thrifty Food Plan, estimated by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which determines how much it would cost to buy groceries for a family of four for a "nutritious, practical, cost-effective diet."

The U.S. government spent $119.4 billion on SNAP in fiscal year 2022.

Johnson said he was disappointed by the "active disinformation" campaigns surrounding the SNAP provisions in the bill, which he said holds benefit increases to inflationary standards.

The idea a president could not unilaterally increase SNAP benefits beyond inflation isn't a cut, Johnson said, but simply an exercise in checks-and-balances.

"The farm bill doesn't cut anybody's benefits. In fact, we know that our farm bill locks in on inflationary increases, so we know the SNAP benefit for a family will be higher next year than it is this year. We know it'll be higher yet the year after that and higher yet the year after that," Johnson said. "So that's clearly not a cut. There is no logical world where that's a cut."

Other aspects of the House markup drew ire from the left, like changes made regarding conservation practices under Title II.

The latest draft could shift billions in Inflation Reduction Act funding to existing farm bill conservation programs while removing the caveat that funding be spent on policies designated as "climate-smart." According to the World Bank, "climate-smart" is an integrated approach to managing land, balancing agriculture and forestry to address the inextricable challenges of food security and climate change.

Johnson advocated for a more flexible approach to conservation, but agreed it's an area where "concerns from the left are probably more fair."

"They want all of these new conservation dollars to be tied to only practices that are verified 'climate-smart.' I think you can have powerful conservation measures that are good for soil health or water quality or habitat and are in fact a good idea – even if they don’t have some provable connection to the climate," he said.

Democrats appear open to tapping unspent IRA funds, but removing guiderails on their spending is a non-starter, according to reporting by Politico.

Legislation like the Conservation Reserve Program Improvement Act — proposed last summer by South Dakota Sen. John Thune and Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) — would increase landowner incentives to develop conservation reserve lands. This House markup included several changes to CRP-adjacent bills, such as the establishment of a 30-year contract for conservation buffer zones around waterways, the removal of income-based requirements for farmers who make 75% or more of their income from agriculture, and the creation of a specialty position to manage the interests of fruit and vegetable growers in the crop insurance program.

Part of the farm bill's goal is to give farmers a sense of predictability from year to year.

In the past, the farm bill was more evenly split between food stamps and risk management policies like crop insurance. Now it’s very uneven — with the farm bill expected to be 83% food stamps, Johnson previously told the Journal.

Still, provisions such as crop insurance and title loan programs aren't going anywhere.

Out of the more than 50 proposed amendments came increases to the sustainable aviation fuel strategy, a change to some pesticide permitting requirements, and an increase in reference prices for the Price Loss Coverage program.

Those reference prices — in this draft up anywhere from 10% to 20% — help offset the loss to farmers if the sale price of their commodity falls below the level allowed by the Price Loss Coverage program. Payments under the Agriculture Risk Coverage program would also increase in an attempt to lessen the pressure of other ad hoc disaster assistance programs.

"We're in a different inflationary environment than we were six years ago, the last time we wrote the Farm Bill," Johnson said. "So we just want to make sure that these — in essence disaster programs — that they take into account the much higher input costs of fuel, seed, fertilizer, when they're determining whether or not they actually trigger to producers."

The South Dakota congressman also had his hand in other provisions, many of which aimed to strengthen the state's ability to do business safely with foreign entities. Johnson's bills that made the cut included the A-Plus Act, which increases investment in smaller meatpackers; the Butcher Block Act to provide assistance to newer or expanding livestock or meat processors; and the SAVE Act, which allows the use of common names for American products in foreign markets.

"Obviously, in South Dakota, we're always going to raise more beef, beans, corn and dairy than we could ever consume ourselves," Johnson said. "And that gives us an opportunity to help feed the world. We know that other countries are hungry for our goods. This farm bill has a major emphasis on removing some of those trade barriers, which is going to make South Dakotans richer and better off," he said.

Johnson, who previously co-owned a broadband engineering and consulting firm, highlighted the strong investments in rural broadband he helped author during this iteration. His FOREST Act would help streamline the permitting process for broadband operations on rural lands.

"Our focus on rural broadband needs to be in building networks that are going to meet the needs not just today, but of five and 10 years from now," Johnson said. "There's no value in investing in antiquated networks."

A provision authored by Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.) passed as part of House Ag's markup. The Livestock Indemnity Program Improvement Act would require the Farm Service Agency to make quarterly updates to their payment rates to keep pace with market prices.

"South Dakota farmers and ranchers work hard to produce quality livestock," Rounds wrote in a statement. "They deserve to be paid a fair, updated market price for their product when extenuating circumstances hurt their operations."

Now that the House Ag committee has passed their version of the legislation, it will need to go to the full House floor for a vote — something that's not likely to happen until September. Much focus is likely to be given to passing the fiscal year 2025 appropriations bills over the summer, and the November general election still looms.

The Senate Ag committee will need to pass their version and send it to the floor for a vote. Once both chambers have passed the legislation, representation from both the House and Senate will meet to form a conference committee, which will be tasked with combining both bills. Each chamber will again vote on the combined legislation before it's sent to the president's desk for a signature.