CQ TODAY ONLINE NEWS – AGRICULTURE
June 14, 2012 – 4:07 p.m.
Stabenow Remains Hopeful About Progress on Farm Bill
By Alan K. Ota and Niels Lesniewski, CQ Staff
Senate Agriculture Chairwoman
Stabenow said in an interview there was a good chance that negotiations between leaders of both parties would lead to a final vote on the bill (
Her comments signaled that Majority Leader
Reid said Thursday morning that Coburn’s idea of 40 amendment votes was a potential model for proceeding on the farm bill.
“He [Coburn] indicated he thought it was a good idea to have a number of amendments and just start voting on them. So I hope we can get there. We can’t do all 250 amendments that are out there, but we can do a lot of them,” Reid said.
In announcing that he did not expect any further votes for the week, Reid remained optimistic about completing work on the measure.
“We hope that we can have common sense prevail,” he said. “It’s so important that we get this done. There are issues that we are going to vote on, one of which Sen. Kerry has talked about. There are . . . relevant amendments, we have a lot of them. We’ll agree to vote on those. We’re trying to also work out the non-relevant amendments and we’re not there yet.”
The amendment offered by Massachusetts Democrat
“We’re still trying to settle the non-relevant, non-germane amendments and the number of those that would be allowed by the leadership,” said
“I think we can accept several but when I say ‘we’ — that’s the decision of Leader Reid. So we’re just trying to get settled first and then get to the germane amendments and, you know, we’ll approach those as they come.”
Despite those efforts, McCain and other critics of federal farm policy have been unhappy with the handling of the amendment process.
“Americans will hear speeches about spending reductions and cuts to farm subsidies, and I concede there is some of that in this bill. Unfortunately, so far we’ve failed to have an open and fair amendment process,” McCain said. “I have several amendments that I would like to have considered, and like my colleagues, we’ve been prevented from doing so.”
Stabenow Remains Hopeful About Progress on Farm Bill
Stabenow, D-Mich., said the Senate could temporarily move off the farm bill next week to take up other matters, including the pending flood insurance reauthorization (