Nov. 18, 2024, 8:15 p.m.
Senate Agriculture Committee Chairwoman Debbie Stabenow released her version of the farm bill on Monday, with just weeks left in session and in her time in the Senate.
The package—named the Rural Prosperity and Food Security Act—contains more than 100 bipartisan bills and $39 billion with investments into crop-insurance affordability, benefits under the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, investments toward addressing climate change, and more.
But time is not on Stabenow’s side to get a farm bill across the finish line before she retires following the upcoming lame-duck session.
Lawmakers and lobbyists have pushed for the completion of a new farm bill this calendar year rather than an extension of the 2018 law. But the likelihood of such a bill clearing Congress in the lame duck remains slim as the body already has a busy to-do list. Congress needs to address either a continuing resolution or an omnibus ahead of the Dec. 20 government-shutdown deadline, along with the must-pass National Defense Authorization Act. In addition, GOP lawmakers are in no rush to pass a Democratic-led farm bill, considering they will run all branches of government come January.
The lower chamber’s version of the farm bill passed the House Agriculture Committee in May, and Senate Agriculture ranking member John Boozman released Senate Republicans’ version in June, but getting something over the finish line has remained difficult, with disagreements on SNAP and more.
Lawmakers could pass an extension of the 2018 law in an end-of-year omnibus package to avoid an antiquated dairy program going into effect.
In a statement, Stabenow said, “This is a strong bill that invests in all of agriculture, helps families put food on the table, supports rural prosperity, and holds that coalition together.”
Sen. Tommy Tuberville, a Republican on the committee, said, “The farm bill proposal that Senate Democrats released today does not adequately address the needs” of farmers, adding that his party “will make our hardworking producers a priority next Congress when Republicans will control both the House and Senate.”
Brendan Carr in the driver’s seat to take over FCC
President-elect Trump has chosen 45-year-old Brendan Carr, a current Federal Communications Commission member and author of the chapter relating to the FCC in the infamous Project 2025 document, to be the agency’s chair when Trump takes over the White House.
“Commisioner Carr is a warrior for Free Speech, and has fought against the regulatory Lawfare that has stifled Americans’ Freedoms, and held back our Economy,” Trump said in statement announcing the pick.
His announcement comes after the former and future president repeatedly disavowed the Project 2025 plan assembled by the Heritage Foundation on the campaign trail.
Trump first appointed Carr to the FCC in 2017, but Carr had worked at the commission since 2012 as a staffer and as general counsel. More recently, he wrote the chapter of Project 2025 relating to the FCC, including plans to use the agency to reduce legal protections for social media sites, increase enforcement actions against big tech companies, and reduce regulations for cable agencies and companies.
Carr wants the FCC to limit protections for social media companies provided by Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act of 1996. Section 230, which ensures that websites are largely immune from lawsuits based on what users post on their sites, has helped clear the way for the current internet dominated by social networks.
Under Carr’s vision, the FCC would pass a rule clarifying that Section 230 protections only fully apply when a company chooses not to moderate content and that only a much more limited form of immunity exists when companies do take action to remove or reduce the visibility of comments. He argued that such a rule would limit the ability of tech companies to censor conservative speech.
On multiple occasions, Carr has advanced the theory that left-leaning tech companies have censored conservative speech, though multiple independent studies have since debunked the theory.
Despite those studies, Trump and other Republicans have long looked forward to punishing tech companies for this perceived bias, and Carr as the head of the FCC will give them that opportunity. In addition to pulling back Section 230 protections, Carr also said the FCC should issue a rule that requires companies like Google, Meta, and Apple to increase their transparency around content-moderation issues.
While Carr may target big tech, he has also said that in general the FCC should be reducing the regulatory burden on cable and internet providers. He has specifically called for changes to media-ownership rules that are meant to block monopolies in different media markets.
DEA extends telemedicine flexibilities through 2025
The Biden administration is officially extending pandemic-era telemedicine prescribing flexibilities for another year, pushing the policy debate squarely into President-elect Trump’s court.
Practitioners will continue to be able to prescribe controlled drugs in Schedules II-V without having to conduct in-person evaluations through 2025.
As COVID-19 pandemic measures winded down in 2023, the Drug Enforcement Administration proposed a more permanent rule that would allow practitioners to remotely prescribe non-narcotic drugs in Schedules III-V and buprenorphine to new patients for 30 days but then would require an in-person evaluation. The proposal received a massive number of comments, more than 38,000, and the DEA is still considering the feedback.
Kyle Zebley, senior vice president of public policy at the American Telemedicine Association, said in a statement that the group will engage with the incoming Trump administration to work on a “permanent framework that ensures appropriate and necessary access to care for millions of Americans.”
The group, which has been very active on the future of telehealth policies, had expressed concern over the DEA’s 2023 proposal. ATA Action wrote to the agency saying an in-person evaluation requirement “is not an effective control against diversion and, instead, simply limits access to legitimate health care.”
“As access to legitimate healthcare is restricted, a consequence of these draft rules, illegal online drug sellers will fill the void,” the group wrote. “Patients who need treatment but now cannot access care via telehealth face a terrible choice: no access to care, or seek medication through unregulated, dangerous sources such as illegal online pharmacies and social media drug dealers.”
Zebley told National Journal that Trump was an “extraordinary champion in telehealth” in his first term, noting that it was his administration that put these flexibilities in place in the early pandemic.
