Articles Tagged with ''Chuck Schumer''

The Senate is beginning negotiations with the House over legislation aimed at boosting U.S. competitiveness abroad, even as there are new signs of division among senators over trade policy, including whether to fully reinstate an exclusion process on Section 301 tariffs on imports from China. 

The House and Senate will soon start negotiating differences between their two approaches to increase U.S. competitiveness abroad. 

Lawmakers are steering $346 million in USDA funding to their home states and districts this year as earmarks returned for the first time since Republicans took control of the House in 2011 and then-President Barack Obama vowed to veto bills that had such designated spending.

President Joe Biden is set to sign a bill reforming the funding and operation of the U.S. Postal Service, with provisions aimed at improving service in rural areas.

Conservation groups and the Biden administration  are betting big that the promise of direct payments to farmers will supercharge their interest in cover crops, a practice relatively few have tried despite documented benefits to soil health, greenhouse emissions and water quality.

Congressional Democrats are punting the next battle over the debt limit until after the 2022 elections, checking off a key item on their long December to-do list, but chances for moving their Build Back Better bill through the Senate are looking less likely.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration has suspended work on its vaccination/testing mandate for private businesses even as some Republicans in Congress vow to oppose funding to enforce the rule.

The House Agriculture Committee will vote next week on a bill that would extend a popular ag disaster program, WHIP+, for two years. Lawmakers have been working on revisions to the Wildfire and Hurricane Indemnity Program Plus, which provided assistance to producers for losses in 2018 and 2019.

Senate Agriculture Committee Chairwoman Debbie Stabenow says she’s “very optimistic” that substantial new funding for farm bill conservation programs will be included in the $3.5 trillion spending agreement that Democrats have announced. Stabenow has been seeking $50 billion in new conservation funding to promote climate-friendly farming practices.

The chairman of the House Agriculture Committee and Ag Secretary Tom Vilsack are taking exception to the white farmers who are challenging a debt relief program for minority producers.