Every five years, Congress reauthorizes the Farm Bill, an expansive legislative package that governs the nation’s food and agricultural systems. Though often described as an agriculture bill, it is equally a nutrition, rural development, conservation, and public health bill. 

The Farm Bill reflects a longstanding bipartisan recognition that agricultural abundance and food security are inseparable. When families can afford food, farmers have stable markets. When farmers thrive, local economies grow. That compact is now under strain.  

What the Farm Bill Covers — and Why It Matters 

The Farm Bill is organized into titles, each governing a different policy domain: 

  • Nutrition (Title IV) — the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), commodity assistance, and related programs 
  • Commodities — direct payments and price supports for specific crops 
  • Crop Insurance — federal subsidies for private crop insurance companies 
  • Conservation — land stewardship and environmental programs 
  • Rural Development — infrastructure and economic investments 
  • Research, Forestry, Trade, and Energy — additional agricultural priorities 

Traditionally, SNAP accounted for the largest share of Farm Bill spending because it was understood that nutrition assistance reaches tens of millions of Americans and serves as an automatic stabilizer during economic downturns. It was never meant to be a “side program,” but central to the agricultural economy itself and the national security of our country. SNAP reduces hunger, improves birth outcomes and chronic disease management, lowers health care costs, and stimulates economic activity. During downturns, each SNAP dollar generates up to $1.80 in economic activity. It supports farmers, grocers, truckers, and food manufacturers across rural and urban communities alike.  

Farm Bills have also strengthened and protected SNAP. The Farm Bill proposed this month, however, fails across the board, particularly coming on the heels of the budget reconciliation law, H.R. 1, which included the largest SNAP cut in history, $187 billion, and fundamentally reshaped the federal-state partnership. 

H.R. 1 converted SNAP from a fully federally funded, countercyclical program into a volatile state liability, just as states face rising health care costs and slowing revenues. 

While SNAP faced historic cuts alongside health care and higher education, H.R.1 delivered substantial benefits to large companies and wealthy individuals.  While the changes in H.R. 1 also ensured that Americans would not have access to economic mobility programs, the wealth transfers enabled billionaires’ wealth to expand, even for non-American-owned companies. H.R. 1 also provided approximately $62 billion in new or enhanced agricultural subsidies, including expansions of Agriculture Risk Coverage (ARC) and Price Loss Coverage (PLC), as well as enhanced crop insurance subsidies. 

The Current Proposal: A Slap in the Face 

The current Farm Bill is not about the small family farmer most Americans envision. It is about concentrated benefits flowing to large agribusiness interests — even as millions of working families face tightened access to food assistance.  

The Farm Bill proposal advanced by House Agriculture Committee  Chairman G.T. Thompson (R-PA) moves forward without restoring the damage inflicted by H.R. 1. 

It fails to: 

  • Reverse the $187 billion SNAP cut. 
  • Restore the federal administrative cost share to 50 percent. 
  • Eliminate punitive benefit cost-sharing tied to error rates. 
  • Protect state budgets and local economies from unfunded mandates. 

Instead, it pursues harmful policies, such as privatizing SNAP eligibility functions, despite documented evidence that prior privatization efforts increased delays, errors, and wrongful denials. 

States and families need less red tape and more stability, not outsourcing schemes that undermine program integrity. 

This is not a funding constraint. It is a policy choice. The H.R. 1  vote made clear where certain policymakers stand. The question now is whether Congress will double down on that choice or take a different course.  

What a Responsible Farm Bill Must Do 

At a minimum, any Farm Bill must restore SNAP to where it stood on July 3 — before H.R. 1’s unprecedented rollback. 

That also means, instead of trying to claw back minimal protections under H.R. 1, the Farm Bill should include the evidence-based legislative priorities that anti-hunger advocates have been clamoring for, such as:   

1. Strengthen Benefit Adequacy

  • Base SNAP allotments on the Low-Cost Food Plan 
  • Eliminate the shelter deduction cap, which negatively affects working families by limiting the amount of shelter costs that households can claim unless one of their members is 60 or older or has a disability.   
  • Streamline medical deductions for older adults and people with disabilities. 

2. End Punitive Time Limits

  • Permanently eliminate the three-month time limit for adults unable to document sufficient work hours. 
  • Recognize that decades of evidence show work requirements do not increase long-term employment but do increase hunger and administrative costs. 

3. Ensure Equity for Students, Veterans, Families, and Individuals Reentering Society 

  • Remove the harsh requirement that full-time students with low incomes must work at least 20 hours to qualify for SNAP, ensuring college students with low incomes are treated equally. 
  • Exclude housing allowances for military families from SNAP income calculations. 
  • Lift the lifetime SNAP ban for individuals with drug felony convictions. 
  • Allow SNAP to be used for hot prepared foods at authorized retailers. 

4. Protect Immigrant Families

  • Advance the Lift the Bar Act to remove arbitrary five-year waiting periods for lawfully present immigrants. 

5. Modernize and Secure the Program

  • Fund EBT chip card transition.  
  • Permanently extend stolen benefit replacement.  

6. Defend Program Integrity and Transparency

  • Stop unlawful data collection demands. 
  • Reinstate USDA’s Household Food Security report to preserve accountability. 
  • Halt the disruptive USDA reorganizations that undermine program administration.  

7. Ensure Parity

  • Allow participation in both SNAP and the Food Distribution Program on Indian Reservations (FDPIR). 
  • Create a pathway for Puerto Rico, American Samoa, and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands to access SNAP. 

This Is About Respect, an America for All, and Reclaiming the Promise of Shared Prosperity 

Americans with low incomes, working families, veterans, older adults, and children deserve the same respect afforded to billionaires and corporate agricultural interests. 

America was built for everyone, not only for those with concentrated wealth and political influence. 

SNAP is  a federal commitment rooted in law and economic reality. It feeds families, stabilizes local economies, and strengthens the agricultural sector. Weakening SNAP weakens farmers, retailers, hospitals, and rural communities. 

A Farm Bill that locks in wealth at the top while stripping food assistance from working families is not a balanced policy. It is a betrayal of the bipartisan compact that has sustained food and farm legislation for generations.  

We Will Not Go Back 

FRAC, along with its network of anti-hunger advocates around the country, has always worked to protect and strengthen SNAP in every Farm Bill cycle. This time, we must not only advance improvements, but also the restoration of what was unjustly taken. 

We will not support any Farm Bill that fails to, at a minimum, restore SNAP to its pre-H.R. 1 structure and funding. 

Congress faces a choice: 

  • Continue down a path that shifts costs to states, destabilizes families, and protects concentrated wealth; or 
  • Reaffirm that hunger has no place in the wealthiest nation on earth. 

Parity matters.
Accountability matters.
Respect matters. 

Take Action:  

There is still time for advocates to urge House Agriculture Committee members to “vote no” on the Chairman’s mark before the multiple-day markup. No Farm Bill, farm relief package, or other legislation should advance without reversing the SNAP cuts in H.R. 1.