Conference Report on H.R. 2642, Federal Agriculture Reform and Risk Management Act of 2014

Floor Speech

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Mr. McGOVERN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 2 minutes.

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank Chairman Lucas and Ranking Member Peterson for all their hard work on this very difficult bill. I admire their tenacity, and I admire their passion on issues dealing with agriculture.

There are some good things in this bill, to be sure, but there are some things that I simply cannot accept. I think as we discuss this farm bill, that we should remind ourselves of a few simple facts, facts like this:

Hunger exists in the United States of America. Not a single congressional district in this country is hunger-free. Our food banks, our food pantries, the people who are on the front lines in the fight against hunger simply cannot do any more. They are stretched to the limit.

One final fact. This bill will make hunger worse in America, not better. If this bill passes, thousands and thousands of low-income Americans will see their already meager food benefit shrink.

And for what? Why? To meet some arbitrary deficit reduction goal? To pay the costs of the giveaways and the crop insurance program? To pay for the sweetheart deals for the sushi rice growers and the peanut farmers and God knows who else?

I know many of my colleagues would just like this whole farm bill issue to go away. They want to pass a bill and forget about it and move on to something else.

But, Mr. Speaker, the people who will be hurt by this bill aren't going away. They can't forget about it and move on to something else because they will suffer. They will have to make do with less food tomorrow than they have today.

I have heard all the arguments trying to justify this $8.6 billion cut in SNAP. Well, it is just a loophole, or it could have been a lot worse, or the States should pick up the slack, or local governments or churches or food banks or the tooth fairy.

Those arguments are easy to make from the comfort of our warm homes and our full bellies, but they ring hollow to an elderly person who will have to take their medicine on an empty stomach, or a child who will have to skip a breakfast before going to school.

I think it is wrong, and I cannot support it.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

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Mr. McGOVERN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 1 minute.

I want my colleagues to understand why those of us who are opposing this bill because of the SNAP cuts are so concerned.

On November 1, when the ARRA moneys ran out, all 47 million people who are on SNAP received a cut. For the average family of three, that was about a $37 reduction per month, which is a lot of money when you are struggling to put food on the table, because, quite frankly, the SNAP benefit in and of itself is not adequate. People end up going to food banks anyway.

If this bill passes, for over 800,000 families, well over 1 million people, for the average family of three, an additional $90 cut will go into effect. That is $120. I don't know where they are going to make that up. I don't know where they are going to go to get help. We can say, yeah, let the States pick it up. Well, the States aren't rushing to pick anything up. Well, let the charities pick it up. Read the newspaper.

Last week, The New York Times said that all of our food banks are at capacity. They can't do it.

So what is going to happen to these people? In the United States of America, the richest country in the history of the world, we ought to all pledge that nobody--and I mean nobody--ought to go hungry. That is what this fight is about.

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Mr. McGOVERN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.

First of all, let me say that I am grateful to Chairman Lucas and Ranking Member Peterson. I appreciate their hard work. I appreciate their dedication on these issues. It is a privilege to be on the Agriculture Committee, and I am proud to serve with them, as with the other members of the committee on both sides of the aisle.

Unfortunately, I cannot support this bill.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to close by speaking to my fellow Democrats.

Last night, we sat in this Chamber and we listened to the President give his State of the Union address. When he talked about raising the minimum wage, we all stood up and cheered. When he talked about the need to address income inequality, we all applauded. But cheers and applause aren't enough.

I ask my colleagues to think back, to remember listening to their parents or their grandparents talk about how Franklin Roosevelt always stood up for the little guy. Remember those pictures of Bobby Kennedy touring through Appalachia and touching the cheeks of hungry children.

That is why we became Democrats in the first place. Those are the people that got us into politics. Those are our people.

Don't throw that away just to be able to say you voted for a farm bill. Don't turn your backs on our heritage and on our history by giving bipartisan cover to what I believe is a flawed bill.

We don't have to do this. The price of admission to pass a farm bill should not be more cuts to SNAP. Make no mistake about it, my friends on the Republican side are not through when it comes to SNAP. They are going to come back after this program again and again and again.

We need to push back. We need to say enough.

Some have rationalized these cuts; some have tried to explain them away as being nothing but closing a loophole. They are wrong. People are going to be hurt. People all over this country--1.7 million people--are going to be impacted by this. There should be nobody in this country--the richest country in the history of the world--who should ever go hungry. That should be a nonpartisan issue.

But to my fellow Democrats, in particular, this is an issue that we have championed time and time again over the many years of the existence of this country.

I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on this conference report. Vote your conscience.

I yield back the balance of my time.

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