Friday cliff hanger..
"The vast majority of our members believe we should have a vote on immigration before the farm bill,” Rep. Mark Meadows said. | J. Scott Applewhite/AP Photo
Freedom Caucus immigration demand could stall farm bill
By LIZ CRAMPTON, HELENA BOTTEMILLER EVICH and RACHAEL BADE 05/17/2018 04:34 PM EDT Updated 05/17/2018 07:12 PM EDT
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A rift in the House GOP over immigration is threatening to scuttle the farm bill.
House Freedom Caucus Chairman Mark Meadows said Thursday his members will not support the measure until after a vote is held on conservative immigration legislation — a move that could sink leadership hopes of voting on the sweeping agriculture and nutrition bill this week.
House GOP leaders maintain lawmakers will still vote on the legislation Friday, despite the threat.
The Freedom Caucus announcement comes after GOP leaders floated a tentative deal to the group of rabble-rousers. Leaders would put the conservative immigration bill introduced by Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.) on the House floor in June if the Freedom Caucus backed the farm bill.
Even after the group rejected that offer, House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy maintained that he was not pulling the bill from the floor. Senior Republicans are holding out hope that they could reach some sort of accord by Friday.
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The scheme by conservatives could throw at least a temporary wrench in House Speaker Paul Ryan’s welfare overhaul push. The farm bill, which covers agriculture subsidies, conservation, rural development and nutrition, would impose stricter work requirements on between 5 million and 7 million food-stamp recipients. The current farm bill expires Sept. 30.
With Democrats planning to vote against the farm bill because of the new work requirements, Republicans need the votes of the Freedom Caucus for the measure to pass.
Meadows said he will have further discussions Thursday evening with leadership “but at this point there is no deal to be made.”
"The vast majority of our members believe we should have a vote on immigration before the farm bill," the North Carolina Republican said.
The caucus met for nearly an hour Thursday afternoon to discuss the plan.
"At this point there's not enough votes to pass the farm bill," Meadows said.
The scramble to try to bring the bill to a vote this week highlights the deep divisions within the Republican Conference. On the right, conservatives have been lukewarm at best on the sweeping bill, arguing it both doesn’t go far enough on work requirements for able-bodied adults receiving food stamps, and does nothing to rein in farm subsidies. Several Republican moderates, meanwhile, have quietly raised concerns about the work requirements.
Conservatives had long been eyeing the bill as a rare chance to enact a piece of a welfare overhaul. It’s the first farm bill cycle in decades where Republicans control both chambers of Congress and the White House.
On Thursday evening, President Donald Trump publicly encouraged support of the farm bill via Twitter. “Tomorrow, the House will vote on a strong Farm Bill, which includes work requirements,” Trump tweeted. “We must support our Nation’s great farmers!”
The House version of the bill, however, is considered a nonstarter in the Senate. Senate Agriculture Chairman Pat Roberts (R-Kan.) and ranking member Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.) are drafting a bipartisan bill. Roberts has said the Senate will not include work requirements, citing his need to get 60 votes.
The food stamp program, now formally known as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, helps more than 40 million low-income Americans buy groceries each month.
The program has long had bipartisan support as well as backing from large food companies and retailers, who now see SNAP as big business. But SNAP’s rolls expanded greatly in the wake of the Great Recession, and while the numbers have come down somewhat, they have not returned to pre-recession levels.
While the farm bill has historically been passed by a coalition of urban and rural lawmakers from both sides of the aisle, talks between Republicans and Democrats broke down earlier this year in the House Agriculture Committee over the work requirements, making the process unusually bitter and partisan.
“The farm bill also keeps faith with these families by not only maintaining SNAP benefits but by offering SNAP beneficiaries a springboard out of poverty to a good paying job, and opportunity for a better way of life for themselves and their families,” House Agriculture Chairman Mike Conaway (R-Texas) said when he unveiled the bill last month.
The bill would require adult SNAP recipients between the ages of 18 and 59 to work or be enrolled in a training program at least 20 hours per week. People who are disabled, pregnant or caring for a child under the age of 6 would be exempt. The plan would also expand the pool of money for state-run work training programs tenfold, from $90 million per year to $1 billion.
The plan to go along with a GOP-only farm bill was originally Ryan’s, according to senior Republican sources. The bill is seen as a personal priority for the speaker, who will retire at the end of the year and has long eyed enacting comprehensive welfare reform.
With leadership relying only on Republican votes for the bill, the House Freedom Caucus saw their opportunity for leverage.
Meadows acknowledged that the farm bill is the last must-pass legislation before the federal government spending bill must be approved in October. “Obviously when you look at that it’s a leverage point,” he said.
Catherine Boudreau contributed to this report.
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