House overrides veto of farm bill
WASHINGTON — With Congress prepared Wednesday to override President Bush's veto of a five-year farm bill, Sen. Charles E. Schumer praised the legislation as a "home run" for New York farmers.
President Bush vetoed the farm bill at midday Wednesday, and the House overrode him a few hours later in a 316-108 vote. The Senate was likely to follow suit today. The bill had passed both houses with veto-proof majorities last week, making the outcome of a veto predictable.
But what should have been a stinging defeat for the president quickly became an embarrassment for Democrats.
Only hours after the House vote, lawmakers discovered that Congress had omitted a 34-page section of the bill when lawmakers sent the massive measure to the White House. That means Bush vetoed a different bill from the one Congress passed, leaving leaders scrambling to figure out whether it could become law.
Democrats hoped to pass the entire bill, again, today under expedited rules usually reserved for unopposed legislation. Lawmakers also probably will have to pass an extension of current farm law, which expires Friday.
"We will have to repass the whole thing, as will the Senate," said Rep. Louise Slaughter, D-N.Y. "We can't let the farm bill just die."
Republican leaders called for a farm bill do-over. The White House, almost gleefully, seized on the fumble and said the mix-up could give Congress time to fix the "bloated" bill.
Mr. Schumer, in a conference call with New York reporters, cited increases in milk subsidies paid to farmers when prices are low, as well as several billion dollars in additional funding or fruit and vegetable growers and conservation programs. He said the bill reflects his and other lawmakers' efforts over several years to expand farm programs to specialty crops grown in New York, as well as preserving the dairy safety net.
"We've spread out the farm bill," Mr. Schumer said.
The bill outlines more than $300 billion in programs covering agriculture, rural development and nutrition programs. The biggest single program in the bill is the food stamp program, which will be expanded and renamed the food assistance program.
Farm groups generally have praised it for striking a compromise among those who wanted to deeply scale back farm subsidies and payments to wealthier farmers, others who wanted to boost food spending for low-income families and still others who wanted a costly permanent disaster aid program.
But the White House called it bloated with unnecessary spending and tax gimmicks, and President Bush said it contained some provisions — such as earmarks and prevailing wage protections — that "have no place in the farm bill."
"Americans sent us to Washington to achieve results and be good stewards of their hard-earned taxpayer dollars. This bill violates that fundamental commitment," Mr. Bush said in his veto message.
In the end, the farm bill proved far too attractive to farm-state lawmakers — and others — for Congress to follow the president. A majority of Republican lawmakers defied him on the legislation, including Rep. John M. McHugh, R-Pierrepont Manor.
Had Mr. Bush's veto prevailed, Congress probably would have had to follow his suggestion of passing a one-year extension, meaning lawmakers would face fall campaigns having failed to pass the most important agriculture legislation since the last election.
Mr. Schumer took some credit for the expansion of the Milk Income Loss Program, which pays dairy farmers when prices fall below a federal target of $16.94 per 100 pounds. However, the final version looked a bit different from what he and other supporters originally envisioned. They failed to reach a goal of doubling the amount of milk eligible for payments, gaining only a slight increase. And the target price will not be increased.
But they won a key provision that will base farmers' payments in part on the cost of feed, which has skyrocketed in the past few years. In practice, Mr. Schumer's office said, the payment for May milk would be based on a federal target of $19.13 per 100 pounds because of the feed cost adjustment.
The senator said the feed adjustment is a "huge improvement" in the MILC program.
More changes in dairy policy may be on the way as a result of the bill. It calls for a federal panel to examine the milk pricing system and determine whether it works in the best interest of farmers, consumers and milk processors, as well as whether it fosters competition in the industry.
