GEORGIA ANGLE
Only five of Georgia’s 14 House members voted for the farm bill: Reps. John Barrow, an Augusta Democrat; Jack Kingston, a Savannah Republican; Austin Scott, a Tifton Republican; Lynn Westmoreland, a Coweta County Republican; and Rob Woodall, a Lawrenceville Republican. Kingston represents a mostly rural South Georgia district and has long supported farm legislation, but he was under pressure from conservative groups to vote against the bill as he mounts a campaign for the Senate. Kingston said the bill’s $20 billion in food stamp cuts and a floor amendment he backed to create a food stamp work requirement — mirroring the 1996 welfare reform — made it worthy of support, as did its agriculture reforms. “Agriculture is a $71.1 billion annual economic impact in our state and employs 6 in 10 Georgians,” Kingston said in a statement. “This legislation is of vital importance to Georgia agriculture because it provides certainty over the next five years.”
Daniel Malloy
HOW THEY VOTED
TEXAS
John Carter (R) Yes
Lloyd Doggett (D) No
Blake Farenthold (R) Yes
Bill Flores (R) Yes
Michael McCaul (R) Yes
Lamar Smith (R) Yes
Roger Williams (R) Yes
OHIO
John Boehner (R) Yes
Steve Chabot (R) No
Jim Jordan (R) No
Michael Turner (R) Yes
FLORIDA
Ted Deutch (D) No
Lois Frankel (D) No
Alcee Hastings (D) No
Patrick Murphy (D) Yes
The House rejected a five-year, half-trillion-dollar farm bill Thursday that would have cut $2 billion annually from food stamps and let states impose broad new work requirements on those who receive them.
Those cuts weren’t deep enough for many Republicans who objected to the cost of the nearly $80 billion-a-year food stamp program, which has doubled in the past five years. The vote was 234-195 against the bill, with 62 Republicans voting against it.
The bill also suffered from lack of Democratic support necessary for the traditionally bipartisan farm bill to pass. Only 24 Democrats voted in favor of the legislation after many said the food stamp cuts could remove as many as 2 million needy recipients from the rolls.
Republicans added the optional state work requirements before the final vote, prompting some Democrats to drop their support.
Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., and No. 2 Democrat Steny Hoyer of Maryland, both of whom voted for the bill, immediately took to the House floor and blamed the other’s party for the defeat.
Cantor said it was a “disappointing day” and that Democrats had been a “disappointing player.”
Hoyer suggested that Republicans voted for the food stamp work requirements to tank the bill.
“What happened today is you turned a bipartisan bill, necessary for our farmers, necessary for our consumers, necessary for the people of America, that many of us would have supported, and you turned it into a partisan bill,” he said.
The Senate overwhelmingly passed its version of the farm bill last week, with about $2.4 billion a year in overall cuts and a $400 million annual decrease in food stamps — one-fifth of the House bill’s food stamp cuts. The White House was supportive of the Senate version but had issued a veto threat of the House bill.
If the two chambers cannot come together on a bill, farm-state lawmakers could push for an extension of the 2008 farm bill that expires in September or negotiate a new bill with the Senate and try again.
Some conservatives have suggested separating the farm programs and the food stamps into separate bills. Farm-state lawmakers have for decades added food stamps to farm bills to garner urban votes for the rural bill. But that connection has made passage harder this year.
House Agriculture Committee Chairman Frank Lucas, R-Okla., said Thursday that the committee is assessing all its options and will continue its work in the “near future.”
Just before the vote, Lucas pleaded with his colleagues’ support, saying that if the measure didn’t pass people would use it as an example of a dysfunctional Congress.
“If it fails today, I can’t guarantee you’ll see in this Congress another attempt,” he said.
Minnesota Rep. Collin Peterson, the senior Democrat on the House Agriculture Committee, said he believes the work requirements and a vote that scuttled a proposed dairy overhaul turned too many lawmakers against the measure.
“I had a bunch of people come up to me and say, ‘I was with you but this is it, I’m done’,” Peterson said after the vote.
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