Farm bill draft heads to House of Representatives

WASHINGTON — It has been nearly eight years since the US government has updated, approved and signed a new farm bill into law, a vital piece of legislation appropriating several billions of dollars for various agriculture, nutrition and conservation programs. The bill typically is renewed every five years, but voting on the bill is often delayed, and the prior cycle’s legislation is sometimes extended. The 2018 farm bill, the last one to be passed by Congress, has been extended twice.

On March 4, the US House Agriculture Committee took the first official step towards renewing the farm bill, which has been rebranded as the Farm, Food and National Security Act of 2026, by passing the committee’s latest draft. It passed via a margin of 34 (27 Republicans and 7 Democrats) to 17 (all Democrats). The draft now moves to the full House for a vote. The Senate Agriculture Committee will follow a similar process, but they have not yet released a version of their farm bill draft. Both versions of the bill must be melded together and given final approval by both Congressional bodies before it can be signed into law by the president. If a final draft of the law is not approved by Sept. 30 of this year, or if the president decides to veto rather than sign it, then another vote to extend the 2018 farm bill for a third cycle will be considered.

The Ag Committee’s version extends several programs in the current farm bill while tweaking others. One contested issue was the protection granted to pesticide manufacturers if producers can prove products were used in compliance with federal label instructions. The bill also prohibits state and local governments from mandating additional restrictions beyond those set by the Environmental Protection Agency.

Also contested was the inclusion to allow year-round sales of E15 gasoline, which contains 15% ethanol. Representative Eric Sorensen, a Democrat from Illinois, proposed the amendment, but Committee Chair GT Thompson said that specific legislation was outside the committee’s jurisdiction and struck the proposal down during the mark up process. 

“Nationally, corn growers are facing their fourth straight year of negative profitability, including an average loss of $125 per acre for the current crop marketing year alone,” Sorensen said. “Allowing year-round E15 would increase domestic corn demand by more than 2 billion bus annually.”

Currently, sales of the higher-ethanol fuel are not available during the summer months due to a regulatory loophole in the Clean Air Act, which has a waiver for E10-blended gasoline but not E15, saying the reason for the omission is that higher-ethanol blend evaporates more quickly in higher temperatures and can produce more smog. Earlier this year, the House said it would create an E15 Rural Domestic Energy Council, which seeks to “develop legislative solutions to address the crisis facing our nation’s farmers and refiners.” Ideas were that pressure from small refinery interest groups blocked the addition to funding bill, which ignited an intense backlash from multiple sectors.

As for nutrition programs, which comprise more than three-quarters of the farm bill budget, the proposed bill maintains specific work requirements that were approved in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act on July 4, 2025. These include raising the age limit needed to meet work requirements for able-bodied adults without dependents to 64 (up from 54 previously) and lowering the age of dependents that qualifies individuals for a work exemption to 14 (down from 18 previously). Several committee members tried to roll those requirements back but were unsuccessful.