[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 159 (2013), Part 10]
[Senate]
[Pages 13876-13877]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                             THE FARM BILL

  Mr. PRYOR. Mr. President, I rise to talk about the farm bill. Ten 
days, that is all the time we have to work out some agreement on our 
farm legislation before we revert to the 1949 farm policy in this 
country.
  Let me make this very clear to the American people and to my 
colleagues. This has nothing to do with the traditional battle lines in 
agriculture. This is not one of those Midwest farming versus Southern 
farming type scenarios. This is not a specialty crop versus a row crop 
type issue. This has nothing to do with that at all. It is an 
ideological fight, where we see hyperpartisanship and gridlock politics 
taking over the Congress.
  Today, the House of Representatives has a vote. It is a very 
important vote. What they are proposing is that they cut $40 billion 
from the nutrition title over 10 years. That is $40 billion.
  Here again, this is not about a traditional fight that you see and 
you have seen for decades in agriculture. This is about hunger in 
America. It is a sad fact. It is something that maybe people in this 
building do not like to acknowledge. But we have people who are hungry 
in this country. They may be people with whom we go to church. They may 
be our neighbors. They may be friends, coworkers, folks with whom we 
graduated from high school. They could be seniors or children or the 
working poor. But we have people in this country who are hungry today.
  Can you imagine America being the land of plenty and having hungry 
people and having folks in this building--in the Chamber of the House 
of Representatives--voting to not lend a helping hand when people need 
it the most?
  I am reminded of that great song, ``America the Beautiful,'' where it 
starts out:

     O beautiful for spacious skies,
     For amber waves of grain,
     For purple mountain majesties
     Above the fruited plain!

  It goes on and on and on to talk about the riches of this great 
country. But, unfortunately, as I said, today we have way too much 
hunger in our Nation.
  The Congress can do something about that. The Congress can do 
something about it. In fact, the Senate already has done something 
about it. Thanks to Senator Stabenow and Senator Cochran and the 
bipartisan efforts on the Senate Agriculture Committee, they made 
responsible reforms in SNAP, in other nutrition programs to streamline 
and fix and correct and improve the nutrition title. They went after 
what we are concerned about, such as waste and abuse of the system, and 
fraud. We all know you have some of that in these programs. But we have 
a saying in our State. It is kind of a country saying. I know people 
have heard it before. But we say: If it ain't broke, don't fix it. Our 
agriculture law in this country ain't broke.
  It can be improved, and I think that is what the Senate has done. The 
Senate has been responsible. The Senate has worked in a bipartisan way. 
Again, that bill passed through this Chamber a few months ago with 66 
votes, a very bipartisan vote. That is the solution. That is the 
solution of us working together.
  Unfortunately, again we have people down the hall in the House of 
Representatives who are going to put that in jeopardy with a ``my way 
or the highway'' political solution. This is not good for the country.
  I think the reason some of these folks are doing this is because they 
do not understand the impact their decision could have on this country. 
But let me put it in perspective. When we look at America, there are 
lots of different ways to look at agriculture and look at our economy 
and look at the global economy, but one way is this: We have several 
core strengths in the U.S. economy. We do some things better than 
anybody else in the world, and one of those is agriculture.
  If we look at investment, if we look at innovation, if we look at new 
farming practices and ways to conserve water--how to get more per 
acre--all these things that improve and increase production and 
nutrition, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, they come from America. It 
is one of the core strengths of the U.S. economy. Everybody in the 
world wants to be like America when it comes to agriculture. Everybody 
wants what we have. They copy us. They model what they do after this 
country. It is something we should be proud of. I know inside the 
beltway it is not very exciting, it is not very flashy, but we have the 
safest and highest quality and, in relative terms, the cheapest food 
supply in the entire world. It is one of the true reasons for America's 
strength.
  But, unfortunately, if we do not pass a new farm bill by September 
30, we run the risk of putting all that in jeopardy, and there could be 
dire consequences. There is no question about it. If we talk to all the 
experts, talk to all the economists, talk to the people who understand 
this, what we can see very clearly is that crop prices will 
destabilize, and that means some prices will go up, some will go down.
  For example, soybean farmers all over this country are going to lose 
their crop support. They are going to lose that protection that has 
been there since the 1960s. Because it was not there in 1949, it will 
be gone, and that will be devastating to the soybean industry. That is 
just one little piece of the puzzle.
  I could go on and on. We have a huge trade deficit in this country. 
We know that. But our saving grace, when it comes to trade, is 
agriculture. Those export programs to sell our ag products overseas 
will be lost if this agreement is not reached.
  Again, food prices will rise dramatically. We have heard others talk 
about that even this morning. The Democratic leader mentioned it. But 
it is going to hurt not only farmers, it is going to hurt families all 
over this country.
  This is personal to me. I know in the Acting President pro tempore's 
home State of Hawaii they have a huge agricultural sector. I know it is 
very important to his State. Everybody thinks of how beautiful Hawaii 
is and tourism and all that, but agriculture is critically important to 
his State's economy, just like it is for the other 49 States. In almost 
every State--maybe with one or two exceptions--agriculture is very 
critical to that State's economy. That is true for Arkansas.
  Again, this is very personal for me. One in six jobs in our State is 
related directly or indirectly to agriculture. Agriculture--we love our 
Fortune 500 companies. We love having them. We have several that are 
based in Arkansas. We are proud of them. But 25 percent of our State's 
economy is tied to agriculture--25 percent.
  So the question is, How do we fix this? It is something we will never 
hear on the talk shows. We will not hear the talking heads chatter on 
about this. But the way we fix it is to work in a bipartisan way, to 
come together, to be very responsible--as the Senate has been on this 
issue--to put something together, and to get it done.
  This is why groups in my State, such as the Arkansas Farm Bureau, 
Agricultural Council of Arkansas, Riceland Foods, Arkansas Rice Growers 
Association, Tyson Foods, the Arkansas Cattlemen's Association, et 
cetera, et cetera, et cetera--the list goes on--all

[[Page 13877]]

supported what we did in the Senate, and they do not support what is 
going on in the House right now.
  But even more important than the groups, I have been around my State, 
of course, all year--and over the last 10 years. But during the August 
recess, I went around the State, and every time I saw a farmer--and I 
literally talked to hundreds of them--they said: Please, please, don't 
let this happen. Don't let this happen. Why do we want to put all this 
at risk? What we have now is working. Sure, we can make improvements. 
Yes, we support the Senate bill. Even though the Senate bill is not 
perfect, we support that because we know the importance of agriculture.
  I would ask my House colleagues to please get themselves out of this 
manufactured crisis they have created for us all. Let's turn off the 
politics. Let's work together. The American people are counting on us.
  I yield the floor.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The assistant majority leader.
  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, are we in morning business at this time?
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. We are.
  Mr. DURBIN. Does the majority have the control for an additional 
period of time?
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Yes.
  Mr. DURBIN. How much time is remaining?
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. There is 20\1/2\ minutes.
  Mr. DURBIN. Thank you very much, Mr. President.

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