House Approves Budget Measure Including Farm Bill Elements

In the wee early hours on Thursday, the House passed landmark budget legislation – or what colloquially is called the “one big, beautiful bill” – to facilitate many of the political objectives of the Trump administration. The 215-214 vote is also a big victory for Speaker Mike Johnson, R-LA, who had to negotiate with multiple factions of House Republicans in the days and hours leading up to the vote. The bill includes an extension of the 2017 tax cuts sought by Trump, as well as hundreds of billions of dollars in new funding for the military and border security. It includes several important Farm Bill elements as well.

Democrats were united in opposition, mostly due to reductions in Medicaid and SNAP spending. In order to corral a majority, the House adopted a number of amendments to the package to address member concerns. In the tax policy area, many provisions of the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act were made permanent including the Section 199A deduction, a goal sought by NMPF and other farm organizations.

The reconciliation bill includes an extension of the Dairy Margin Coverage program through 2031, providing dairy producers with much-needed continuity. The package also bases the program’s production history calculation on a farmer’s highest production year out of 2021, 2022, or 2023, an update to better reflect recent farm production levels. The bill also includes NMPF’s request to fund mandatory USDA dairy processing plant cost surveys every two years.

The legislation now must be approved by the Senate before summer, where many of the sticking points of the House bill will be revisited as the GOP reaches for 50 votes. Regardless of any changes considered in the Senate, the bill will need to be vetted via the “Byrd Bath” to ensure it complies with Senate rules that dictate what can be included in budget reconciliation legislation.

Odds Good for Passage of Whole Milk Legislation, Sen. Welch Says
One of the strongest supporters of expanding milk options in school lunches says that momentum is building behind the bipartisan Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act. In our latest Dairy Defined podcast released this week, Sen. Peter Welch, D-VT, said the milk options bill has a 60 percent chance of becoming law this year.

“This is one of those things where, if we get it on the floor, and get the cooperation of leadership, we get the votes,” he said. “This is one of those areas of rare bipartisanship that we have right now.”

Welch, the ranking member of the Senate Agriculture Committee’s rural development subcommittee, is the lead Senate Democratic co-author of the Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act, which passed the House of Representatives in 2023, and this year is advancing in both chambers. The legislation would restore the ability of schools to offer whole and 2% milk as options.