Pork producers hear farm bill 2.0 update

SPRINGFIELD, Ill. — Markup of the new farm bill is underway and Illinois pork producers got a firsthand account of the legislation by the U.S. House Agriculture Committee chair.

“My role on the House Ag Committee means that every farmer, rancher and rural American is my constituent, and I’m very proud to work on your behalf in the halls of Congress,” Rep. Glenn “GT” Thompson, R-Pa., said at the Illinois Pork Producers Association’s new Swine Mixer on Feb. 17.

“Nobody knows the challenges and opportunities facing farmers and ranchers like the people there with boots on the ground every day.”

The road to replace the 2018 farm bill began two years ago and included hosting 150 listening sessions across 43 states and one territory for feedback from farmers and ranchers.

“We’ve done this from a perspective of legislating from the outside-in, which is a little different from what normally happens,” said Thompson at the event held at the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum in Springfield.

“We work on behalf of Illinois and America’s No. 1 industry — agriculture. That’s why we took the show on the road. That’s why we came out on farms and ranches, we talked with people and we found out maybe not what you wanted, but what you needed.

“Our goal is to get this passed out of the House by Easter (on April 5) and on to the Senate.”

“Nobody knows the challenges and opportunities facing farmers and ranchers like the people there with boots on the ground every day.”

—  Glenn Thompson, chair, U.S. House Agriculture Committee

The farm bill was introduced to the House on Feb. 13, and Thompson said the Farm, Food and National Security Act of 2026 is vital for the ag economy and hopes it becomes law soon.

Several provisions that are typically in a farm bill were passed by Congress in its Working Families Tax Cuts legislation, signed by President Donald Trump on July 4.

Congress made agricultural investments in the Working Families Tax Cuts, but there were key policy components that remained to be addressed.

“Even all these investments we made with farm bill 1.0, we still have a lot of work to do with farm bill 2.0. The remaining programs that couldn’t be included in the Working Families Tax Cuts spans across 12 titles of the farm bill. They, quite frankly, affect everybody in this room,” Thompson said.

“A new farm bill will prioritize American producers on the global stage. We’re doubling the funding for trade promotional programs, market access programs, foreign markets development programs. Why did we go in there? Because every time I came to Illinois, that’s what you told me we needed to do. We needed to double the program that hadn’t increased at all from the time that it had been created, and we are accomplishing that.”

Proposition 12

The proposed farm bill also addresses California’s Proposition 12 that forbids the sale of whole pork meat in California from hogs born of sows not housed in conformity with that state’s law.

“Prop 12 is, at its core, a regulatory overreach from state of California. It’s based on political science, not animal science, not real science,” Thompson said.

“We believe that hog farmers know their operations best when it comes to animal health and safety. At the end of day, it’s just not common sense to allow a small percentage of California voters to get Prop 12 passed. If you look when that proposition was passed, it was an off-year election and less than 10% of California citizens voted for that measure. And some of those have voted in election actually voted to oppose Prop 12.

“The numbers were pretty low and to dictate to how someone in Illinois or anywhere else in the country raises her animals is just wrong.”