Senate farm bill draft focuses on farm economy, keeps ‘Big Beautiful’ SNAP cuts

The U.S. Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry released its 2026 Farm Bill draft.(Photo from USDA)

Nearly two months after the U.S. House passed a farm bill proposal, the Senate Agriculture Committee has released an initial draft of the omnibus legislation that covers everything from crop insurance to nutrition assistance. 

The farm bill draft, dubbed the Agricultural Act of 2026 and put forward by Sen. John Boozman, R-Ark., expands crop insurance coverage, shifts funding in conservation programs and maintains changes to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program made in Republicans’ 2025 spending bill. 

While the draft is fairly similar to the farm bill proposal advanced by the House at the end of April, it does not include language that livestock industries have called for to stop the impact of state-specific laws on livestock production standards. The bill is also silent on the issue of pesticide labeling — another hot-button issue among farm, health and environmental groups — and on the year-round sale of a higher blend of ethanol. 

Industry and political response to the draft language stressed the importance of Congress passing a farm bill, since the massive piece of legislation has not been reauthorized since 2018. Typically the bill is refreshed every five years, but lawmakers, unable to reach a compromise the past several years, have instead relied on federal spending bills to extend the essential provisions of the bill. 

Boozman, the chairman of the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry, said the text included bipartisan priorities to “strengthen the American farm economy, increase investments for rural communities and foster a more resilient agricultural sector.” 

“I’m proud to put forward this discussion draft that reflects the input and priorities of Republicans, Democrats, and most importantly, rural America,” Boozman said in a statement. “This bill is built for the people who feed America, and I look forward to continuing conversations with my colleagues about how we can best serve them and the communities they call home.” 

Criticism on the proposal largely centered on its SNAP language.

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Disagreements across the aisle over SNAP have reached new heights in the farm bill debates this year as Democrats push for changes to the program that were enacted through the Republican-led budget reconciliation bill. The legislation, known as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act or Working Families Tax Cuts Act, initiated eligibility changes to the program and shifted part of the cost of benefits to the states.

The Senate farm bill draft builds on the provisions of the 2025-passed tax and spending cut bill, despite urging from Democratic lawmakers and anti-hunger groups to use the farm bill to reverse provisions in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act that could lead millions to lose benefits. 

Senate Agriculture Committee Democrats said in a statement that the text introduced by Boozman did not address the “devastating cuts” to SNAP put into law through H.R. 1. 

“Senate Agriculture Committee Democrats have been clear that a Farm Bill must meet the needs of both farmers and families across America,” the statement said.

The Senate farm bill draft builds on requirements for transparency in the SNAP program and would require agencies to report on all SNAP payment errors, regardless of dollar amount. Currently, errors are only reported if they are in excess of $58. 

This provision, which is also included in the House-passed farm bill, would provide a supplemental report on errors in the state. Only errors above the set threshold, $58, would be used to calculate a state’s payment error rate. This rate, under changes made in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, then determines the share of SNAP benefits that a state must pay. Recent data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture shows that just nine states had rates below the 6% cutoff, set by the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, that keeps the program 100% federally funded.  

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According to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, shifting 5% to 15% of total benefit costs to the states will cost states an estimated $9 billion. Ty Jones Cox, vice president for food assistance at the center, urged Congress to delay the October 2027 implementation of the provision. 

“The farm bill proposal released today by Senate Agriculture Committee Chair John Boozman ignores the rapidly worsening hunger crisis in the wake of the 2025 Republican reconciliation law,” Jones Cox said in a statement. “This proposal — or any legislation with farm relief that ignores the urgent need to mitigate this harm — should be rejected.” 

Lawmakers and agricultural groups that commented in favor of the Senate’s draft language primarily spoke to the benefits the bill would provide to farmers, though some noted their support for the bill’s continuation of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act provisions. 

“I am encouraged to see Chairman Boozman release a Farm Bill draft that builds on many of the priorities Senate Republicans fought to secure in the Working Families Tax Cut Act,” Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, said in a statement. “I am proud the draft includes my proposals to crack down on foreign adversaries purchasing American farmland, increase transparency and accountability in SNAP, expand local meat processing options, and prohibit taxpayer dollars from funding research in countries of concern like China and Iran.” 

The Senate’s draft reauthorizes SNAP appropriations at the same level currently allocated through 2031, which is the same approach taken in the House’s version of the bill. 

The Senate farm bill draft also expanded eligible forms of produce and dairy allowed in federal nutrition programs. 

Both the House and Senate proposed bills included language to create a local food purchasing program with an authorization of $200 million through 2031. The language is similar to a pandemic-era program called Local Food Purchase Assistance, which has since ended. The proposed farm bills stipulate this program would support state agencies’ purchase of minimally processed food from producers within 400 miles of the distribution site. 

Conservation

Boozman’s office said in a news release that the draft language “streamlines and strengthens” USDA conservation programs. Boozman said his bill also creates the “broadly popular” forest conservation program and the State Conservation Assistance Program to support state-led conservation efforts. 

Environmental groups, however,  criticized the bill for not expanding popular conservation programs, the Environmental Quality Incentives Program, or EQIP, and the Conservation Reserve Program or CRP, both of which incentivize farmers to add conservation practices to their land.

While the Senate bill extends the CRP program, it caps enrollment at 27 million acres — the same cap set in the House-passed bill. 

According to a Congressional Research Service report comparing the 2026 House-passed farm bill with current policy, language affecting conservation programs constitute the largest changes in the House version of the farm bill. The House farm bill would reduce the budget authority of the EQIP program by $1 billion over the next 10 years, using the money to instead fund the Forest Conservation Easement Program and increases to other conservation programs. 

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The Senate draft also significantly shrinks the EQIP budget authorization and the Conservation Stewardship Program in a move the Environmental Working Group said “runs counter” to the Trump administration’s Make America Healthy Again initiative. 

“Prioritizing regenerative agriculture practices like cover crops and encouraging farmers to develop whole farm conservation plans are important steps to improving farm resilience,” EWG’s legislative director Geoff Horsfield said in a statement. “Rather than cut money for these popular programs, Congress must provide more funding to meet the growing backlog of farmer demand for the most effective conservation practices.” 

Ryan Bronson, the director of government affairs for the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation, said in a statement that the conservation title in the proposed bill was “robust” and “critical to maintain voluntary, incentive-based land stewardship that helps to sustain rural communities.”

Farm safety net

The farm bill stipulates the scope of crop insurance, federal loans, credit and reimbursement programs that are essential to most farming operations. 

Both the House version and drafted Senate version of the bill expand crop insurance to cover “losses due to a decline in the market price” of a commodity, where current policy covers only crop losses caused by “drought, flood, or other natural disasters.”

National Farmers Union President Rob Larew said while the Senate draft includes “meaningful improvements,” it does not fully address the “scale of the crisis” farmers and ranchers are currently facing. 

“What we need is a true safety net that moves away from ad hoc assistance, keeps pace with rising production costs and delivers real stability in the marketplace,” Larew said in a statement.

Farmers Union called for greater support of “core farm programs” and a disaster relief program that “doesn’t require farmers to wait on Congress to act.” 

The current farm bill proposals both include language that would authorize USDA to issue block grants to states following natural disasters to, as the summary for the Senate draft said, “provide quicker and more regionally suited assistance.” 

The Agricultural Act of 2026 changes crop insurance policies to be more specific for specialty crop farmers and establishes the Specialty Crop Advisory Committee. The House version also created this additional committee. 

National Potato Council CEO Kam Quarles thanked Boozman for the farm bill draft and its language for specialty crop farmers. 

“We are hopeful that meaningful discussions will be generated by today’s release and result in a broadly supported bill being reported to the Senate floor this summer,” Quarles said in a statement. “In particular, we thank the Chairman for recognizing the imperative of specialty crop economic relief and his common-sense framework for delivering vital resources to America’s family-owned potato farms.”

The Senate draft language also increases farm loans to “better reflect today’s cost of doing business” according to a summary of the text, and expands certain credit and loan programs for beginning farmers and fishing industries.

American Farm Bureau President Zippy Duvall said the bill was a “good first draft” and that the farmer group appreciated the bill’s improved access to credit, expanded specialty crop investments and fertilizer industry transparency. 

“We urge the Senate to quickly pass a bipartisan farm bill, and with the same sense of urgency, Congress must work together to address these additional priorities,” Duvall said in a news release. “It’s time to deliver solutions to America’s farmers and ranchers.”

Hot button issues left out of the draft

Duvall also called for the farm bill to include an economic assistance package for farmers following a “multiyear downturn,” legislation to “protect interstate commerce” and to allow the nationwide, year-round sale of E15 fuel.

Previous farm bill drafts have included language on controversial issues like pesticide labeling policies and livestock housing regulations, but the Senate’s 2026 farm bill draft does not include either. 

Environmental and animal rights groups applauded the omission of language from the Save Our Bacon Act, which would stop state laws from dictating the production standards of agricultural products sold into the state.  

Supporters of the Save Our Bacon language, including Farm Bureau, say it protects interstate commerce from a “patchwork” of differing state laws, in particular California’s Proposition 12, which stipulated that meat sold in the state must be raised within certain animal confinement provisions. 

Language similar to the Save Our Bacon Act was included in the House-passed farm bill.

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The environmental group Food & Water Watch commended the Senate bill for not including the anti-Prop 12 language, but the group said the Senate’s farm bill “fails to address the root causes” of the food and farm “crisis” in the country. 

“After years of skyrocketing food prices, family farm decimation and worsening climate impacts, Congress should use the Farm Bill to build a resilient food system – not double-down on the same corporate model that created these problems in the first place,” Food & Water Watch Food Policy Director Rebecca Wolf said in a statement. “We need a fair Farm Bill, not one that continues to prioritize agribusiness profits over farmers, workers, consumers and the planet.”

Food & Water Watch was also appreciative that the draft bill did not include a provision to protect pesticide manufacturing companies from certain lawsuits related to pesticide labeling. 

The farm bill that advanced from the House Agriculture Committee included pesticide labeling language, but the provision was removed before the bill passed from the House. 

Similar language has cropped up in states across the country, including Iowa, where the bill stalled in 2025, and has been supported by Bayer, the maker of the popular herbicide Roundup and the subject of numerous lawsuits alleging the product caused certain types of cancer. 

A Thursday ruling from the U.S. Supreme Court, however, enforced the strength of federal pesticide labeling and overturned a $1.25 million Missouri court verdict in which a man alleged that Roundup caused his non-Hodgkin lymphoma. Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., said he plans to file an amendment to the farm bill that would strip the federal preemption clause used in the court’s ruling. 

The Senate farm bill draft did not include a provision for the year-round, nationwide sale of E15, a higher blend of ethanol fuel, that farm groups have been calling for with urgency. 

Farm groups, however, were encouraged by a letter sent Wednesday by President Donald Trump urging Congress to pass legislation that would permit the nationwide sale of the fuel. 

The Senate farm bill proposal also expands USDA Rural Development programs for things like rural broadband access, water treatment infrastructure and economic development.

“America’s farmers, ranchers and producers have always answered the call to do more to feed the nation,” Boozman said on the Senate floor when introducing the bill. “Farm Bill 2.0 is built to support the backbone of our food system.”

The Senate’s Agricultural Act of 2026 will be considered and most likely amended in the U.S. Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry before the bill can head to the full Senate. As of Friday, a committee markup on the bill had not been scheduled.