A diverse group of House Democrats sent a letter last Friday to the leaders of the Farm Bill conference, urging committee members to accept the dairy title in the House-passed version. The group supported the Goodlatte-Scott amendment when it passed in June by an overwhelming vote of 291-135 and said the vote represents a “rare display of bipartisan cooperation whose results should not be overturned by the conference.”

“This is a very impressive list of Democrats as it has members of the New Democrat Coalition, the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and the Congressional Black Caucus, among others,” said Jerry Slominski, IDFA senior vice president of legislative affairs and economic policy. “The writers are geographically and politically diverse, representing constituents in a variety of key states, including California, Florida, New York, Texas and Wisconsin.”    

The 28 Democrats are opposed to the supply management proposal, called the Dairy Market Stabilization Program, included in the Senate version of the Farm Bill. In the letter, they outline the harm that would come from the program, including a spike in consumer milk prices that would erode the ability for many Americans, especially those on government assistance, to meet the nutritional guidelines set by the federal government.

IDFA recently created a flyer that shows how the Dairy Market Stabilization Program would affect recipients of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP. If the DMSP was triggered only one month per year, SNAP recipients could be forced to pay nearly $1 billion to meet dairy consumption recommendations; that’s the equivalent of a 25-percent increase in the SNAP cuts in the Senate bill.

IDFA is distributing the flyer to Capitol Hill offices and encourages members to share the flyer with their senators and representatives. Download the flyer here.

For more information, contact Slominski at jslominski@idfa.org.