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Stabenow has questions for USDA before granting more funds
The Ranking Member of the Senate Ag Committee says she doesn’t support giving USDA access to more Commodity Credit Corporation funds, as ag groups are requesting, without more details.
Debbie Stabenow of Michigan says Congress has already raised CCC funds to $30 billion and USDA has only have spent a third of that.
“They have not spent the funds that they have been given first of all. Second, there’s no specifics on how they want to spend the money, and third, I want to make sure that they are not threatening the October payments for farm bill programs.”
She says Congress also needs to pay attention to families in need of food from the SNAP program during the COVID crisis.
Stabenow says Congress would be foolish to give USDA more funds when they haven’t followed the intent of ag funding in the CARES Act.
“When it says $9.5 billion for specialty crops, livestock, dairy, and local foods, I didn’t know we had to say ‘Yes, we really meant it.’”
Stabenow told reporters this week she’s disappointed zero dollars in CFAP funds have been allocated toward local foods and the lack of transparency in the process makes it difficult to determine the need for more money.
