Iowa Congressman Steve King, a Republican from Kiron, is hopeful the U.S. House can pass a Farm Bill after a vote last week failed. The five-year bill was defeated after 62 Republicans voted against it despite being urged by House Speaker John Boehner to support it.
King says he starts work on reviving the bill today. “And it’s gonna take discipline, we’re going to put our nose to the grindstone and see what we can do to put this together,” King says.
He expects to meet with the chair of the House Ag Committee tonight. All of Iowa’s congressmen voted for the bill that failed. King says he supported the bill because it cut $2-billion from the Food Assistance Program.
“This bill laid the foundation so that five years from now we can move this even more in a conservative direction and reform the Food Stamp side more and also…bring a little more equity into the crop insurance premiums so that there’s not a regional subsidy taking place on marginal land,” King says.
Senate Majority Leader, Harry Reid says his chamber won’t pass an extension of the Farm Bill this year and is pressuring the House to pass a bill before the extension of the current bill expires on September 30th.
By Woody Gottburg, KSCJ, Sioux City