Skip to content

Policy Updates and Issue News June 2025

Agriculture and Food

Farm bill provisions hit a snag

Commodity price support and nutrition assistance sections of the farm bill have been included in the budget reconciliation package moving through Congress. Actions by both the House and Senate Agriculture Committees would make massive cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) and use part of those savings to increase commodity support prices. SNAP benefits would also be eliminated for immigrants who aren’t citizens or who do not have legal permanent residency. The legislation would impose a state cost-share for SNAP payments and place new administrative burdens on many counties. The reconciliation package cleared the House in late May, and the Senate has targeted passage before Congress’ July 4 recess.  However, the Senate parliamentarian invoked the Byrd Rule and prevented the Senate from imposing a state cost-share, negating a major source of spending cuts for the legislation.  The immigrant assistance SNAP ban was also ruled out of order. The Byrd Rule, established in 1985, forbids Congress from including provisions in budget reconciliation that are not primarily budgetary. So, it was back to the drawing board for commodity price supports, SNAP and several more provisions that have been ruled out of the budget reconciliation package by the Sente Parliamentarian. As of the week of June 24, the Senate Ag Committee had made revisions to the SNAP cuts provisions that subsequently won the parliamentarian’s approval.  This clears the way for SNAP cuts and additional funding for commodity price supports. The Senate is constantly negotiating these and other reconciliation package revisions with the House and plans to begin voting on the legislation June 27. The goal is to have the reconciliation bill on the President’s desk by July 4.

Alarm sounded on New World screwworm

New World screwworm fly larvae burrow into the flesh of living animals causing serious and often deadly damage to livestock, pets, wildlife, occasionally birds, and in rare cases, people. The pest was eradicated from the U.S. in the 1960’s and contained to South America using sterile fly technology. However, screwworm was detected in southern Mexico late in 2024, causing alarm that it could again spread to the United States. In mid-June, Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins announced efforts to combat the northward migration of the screwworm that includes:

  • Build a sterile fly production facility at Moore Air Force Base in Texas.
  • Renovate an existing fly production facility in Metapa, Mexico to support an existing facility in Panama.
  • In-person visits to audit Mexico’s animal health controls.
  • USDA cattle fever tick riders along the southern border will collaborate with Customs and Border Protection and state partners to intercept stray and illegally introduced livestock.

Health Care

Medicaid cuts expected to batter rural health care

Massive cuts to the Medicaid program that are being proposed in the budget reconciliation package moving through Congress will have a devastating effect on the future of rural health, according to our friends at the National Rural Health Association. More than 300 rural hospitals would be pushed toward a fiscal cliff by the legislation. Rural Americans are more likely to depend on Medicaid than the general population. Rural patients tend to be uninsured or underinsured and therefore unable to pay the full amount of the rural hospital service. Providers then look to Medicaid to cover those costs.  The National Grange is waging a high-profile public campaign to raise awareness in Congress and mitigate the severity of those cuts. The legislation also looks to cut waste, fraud and abuse and initiate new work requirements which the Grange policy does not oppose.

Hamp Op Ed hits D.C. press

National Grange president Chris Hamp penned an opinion editorial that ran in the DC Journal and highlighted the consequences of massive Medicaid cuts. She pointed out that a large number of rural families lack access to employer-based health care benefits. Private insurance remains out of reach for small business owners, ag workers, machinery operators, day laborers, and many others. She concluded by pointing out that every American-regardless of their zip code-deserves the dignity of timely, affordable health care, and Medicare makes that possible for millions in rural communities.

Why not a rural hospital carve-out?

Senate Republican leaders are working to assuage a group of reconciliation package holdouts who are concerned with the rural consequences of such deep Medicaid cuts. The holdouts include Collins of Maine, Hawley of Missouri and others.  The Grange is asking why not create a legislative carve-out for rural hospitals?

Immigration / AG Workforce

Whiplash on the farm and Ranch

Undodumented ag labor has been vital to food production in America for decades as the domestic workforce found easier, better paying jobs elsewhere. As recent deportation efforts of the federal government escalated, farms and ranches began to report Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) division of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) raids. The overwhelmingly majority of these undocumented workers are neither criminals nor part of recent waves of illegal immigration across our southern border and have been working here for years, according to farm and ranch employers. In early June, President Trump announced that farmworkers who are in the country illegally should not be deported. A memorandum from an official at DHS to regional ICE offices followed that said, “Effective today, please hold all work site enforcement investigations/operations on agriculture (including aquiculture and meat packing plants), restaurants and operating hotels.”  A few days later, a call from ICE and DHS officials to agency leaders indicated that agents must continue conducting immigration raids on agricultural businesses, hotels and restaurants. The apparent reversal by DHS means there’s a lot of internal dialogue happening at the White House.  The National Grange is a member of the Ag Workforce Coalition that is trying to get clarification of administration policy. There is some indication that ICE is primarily after those individuals with criminal records rather than long term workers. If that’s the case, producers are telling the coalition they will gladly cooperate with ICE efforts but are also asking ICE to leave their non-criminal workforce alone.

Taxes

Grange policy supports tax cuts

The National Grange member-derived policy supports the tax cuts provisions moving through Congress as part of the budget reconciliation package. The Grange and 44 other members of the Tax Aggies Coalition sent a letter to the House leadership and the Chairman of the House Ways and Committee thanking them for their efforts to advance tax provisions needed by farmers, ranchers and small businesses. A similar letter followed to the Senate leadership and Chairman of the Senate Finance Committee. Several of the key tax relief provisions include estate tax relief, qualified business income deduction, lower tax rates, increasing Section 179 expensing allowance and restoring 100% bonus depreciation.

Telecommunication

Use all technologies to reach the last mile of country road

This is the member-derived National Grange policy on broadband deployment. The preference is of course to use fiber where it is practical and cost effective. Where it is not because of topography or distance, let’s get on with connecting rural families and farms and ranches in remote areas with other technologies. That has been the Grange drumbeat for the past several years. On June 24, Nebraska Grange member Matt Peterson joined panel members from the Connect Everyone Coalition on a national webinar to explore the features of low Earth orbit satellites to deliver high speed broadband to unserved and underserved remote areas. Then as USTelecom president and CEO Jonathan Spalter said recently, “Our government should be concerned with outcomes for the people and not endless processes, regulations, and delays. The only thing stopping us from connecting everyone in this country -expanding their opportunities and improving the benefits for everyone- is too much delay and inaction and not enough GSD (Get Stuff Done).”

Of Interest

“Make America Healthy Again” report questioned

Efforts by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to make America healthy again have run into trouble. Secretary Kennedy leads the Make America Great Again Commission establishes by President Trump. The highly anticipated Commission report on the potential drivers of childhood chronic diseases criticizes many aspects of the food system including the role of ultra-processed foods, added sugars, food dyes, seed oils, food additives and chemical contaminants. However, the report cited some nonexistent and erroneous studies. Apparently, much of the report was created using artificial intelligence (AI) which resulted in numerous errors. The Commission is expected to correct the errors and form a federal strategy to include more definitive poly recommendations.

Perspective

“We never know the love of a parent till we become parents ourselves.”  ~  Henry Ward Beecher

 

“Little league baseball is a very good thing because it keeps the parents off the street.”  ~  Yogi Berra

 

“We are the people our parents warned us about.”  ~  Jimmy Buffett

 

“My heroes are and were my parents. I can’t see having anyone else as my heroes.”  ~  Michael Jordan