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Grassley says he’ll vote against the farm bill–again
Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley says he will vote against the 2018 farm bill because it expands the loopholes on farm subsidy payments.
Grassley, a long-time proponent of tighter payment limitations, voted against the 2014 farm bill for the same reason. But he says this bill widens those loopholes even more.
“You could already drive a truck through it. (Now) you could drive a John Deere combine through it,” Grassley says. “It’s just gets bigger and bigger and bigger.”
Grassley says the provisions, which were championed by House Ag Committee chair Mike Conaway of Texas, make it easier for relatives of farmers to become eligible for farm payments.
Grassley says those payments should only go to “real farmers”.
“And prevent people that don’t have dirt under their fingernails, who could be on Wall Street or anyplace else, from getting the subsidy. The only reason they can earn it is because they’re listed as a manger on a farm that they may not even pay much attention to.”
Grassley says he wishes he cold vote for the farm bill because of the many good provisions it contains. But he says he doesn’t want to be “intellectually dishonest” in voting for something he has fought so hard to change.
AUDIO: Excerpts from Grassley’s conference call with ag reporters
Senator Grassley, needs to get outside the Beltway and realize that farmers now wear gloves and very few have dirt under their fingernails. Farmers have to involved nephews and others and work outside jobs to be able to farm due to his type of thinking. Farming is tough and expensive business.