News Room

Senate to Postpone Markup of Farm Bill Until After Break

Senate Agriculture Committee Chairman Tom Harkin postponed today's markup of the farm bill. The markup -- a committee session held for members to introduce amendments to the chairman's draft of the bill -- had been announced only hours before it was postponed.

Harkin cited Senate scheduling difficulties. Other observers doubted he had the votes needed on his committee to advance the bill. Apparently neither Democrats nor Republicans had seen the total package of the chairman's proposed legislative language as well as its cost scoring. Funding for the bill has been an ongoing struggle because it is limited to the current baseline spending.

Additional funding from a tax package developed by the Senate Finance Committee was part of the strategy to prop up farm bill spending. But, details of that tax package were not released until Tuesday. The Finance Committee will vote on the tax today during a 2 p.m. business session. That package would raise $3.9 billion in additional funding for energy, conservation, beginning farmers, and rural development in the farm bill, and $6.1 billion over five years for the disaster trust fund provision, according to the Joint Committee on Taxation scoring.

Although Harkin had predicted he would be able to hold the agriculture committee's markup session before the Senate recesses next week for Columbus Day, he did not finalize plans for the session until Wednesday afternoon. Republicans on the committee were kept in the dark about plans as late as 2 p.m.

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