No announcements about the content of the farm bill will be made until Congress returns to Washington next week. The chairmen and ranking members of the committees have continued working to merge the House and Senate bills into a conference report but no details have been released. Senate Agriculture Committee Chair Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) has said that the chief negotiators want to present the bill’s framework to the conferees before releasing it publicly.
Representative Kristi Noem (R-SD), one of the 41 farm bill conferees who are expected to vote on a unified House-Senate farm bill this month, said the bill is essentially finished and only in need of some “tweaking.” “The lead farm bill negotiators have outlined the reforms they agree can be made in the bill,” she said. “Right before Christmas, they got estimates back to see how much these reforms would cost–or in some cases, save. Now, it is a matter of tweaking the bill to make sure all the numbers add up, but we are on track to finish a comprehensive five-year farm bill during the first part of 2014.” Noem told constituents.
The Senate recessed on December 20 and is scheduled to return on January 6. The House left a week earlier and is expected to return on January 7.
