Pressing food and farm issues helped propel Democrats to sweeping victories in the Nov. 3 midterm election, delivering them control of the House and Senate and clearing a path toward major changes to federal food and agriculture policies.
“Tariffs, diesel, fertilizer, farm labor, and grocery bills were all on the ballot,” David Ortega, a professor of food economics and policy at Michigan State University, wrote on LinkedIn. “The question now is what those results change about food and farm policy.”
On CNN, Representative Hakeem Jeffries (D-New York), now poised to become the Speaker of the House, said one of Democrats’ first priorities will be to get President Donald Trump to end the war with Iran, in an effort to (among other goals) bring down high diesel and fertilizer prices, issues that have been at the forefront of concerns for many farmers. Democrats also hope to expand Medicaid and restore Affordable Care Act subsidies, which farmers and rural communities rely on.
Trump will still have veto power, but in Congress, Democrats will take over steering the future of important legislation, including the farm bill, which is currently three years late and has stalled in the Senate, due to party-line disagreements over changes Republicans made to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).
Senator Michael Bennet (D-Colorado), who recently held a roundtable to highlight how those changes have increased hunger, is preparing to become Senate Agriculture Committee chairman.
“I’m committed to go back and to try to make sure that we get this farm bill passed,” he told food bank operators at an event in mid-October, “and that we are not just reversing the [SNAP] cuts, but we’re actually improving the work that we’re all doing together.”
Bennet’s chairmanship is not a done deal: Senator Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), who pulled off a red-state upset to regain a seat he lost two years ago, could get the job, based on his former seniority.
Prominent Republicans represented on the ag committee will also depart, opening up seats. Senator Roger Marshall (R-Kansas) lost his race to Democrat Adam Hamilton, while Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith’s (R-Mississippi) race is still too close to call.
Meanwhile, Representatives Shontel Brown (D-Ohio) and Jim Costa (D-California) will vie for the top seat on a changing House Agriculture Committee. Representatives David Valadao (R-California) and Zach Nunn (R-Iowa), who were members of the committee, were unseated by Democratic challengers.
State leadership changes
While federal law gets made in Washington, D.C., states are often responsible for implementation. At the state level, Democratic governors will now run the majority of states for the first time since 2010, with implications especially for how SNAP changes are rolled out.
“I think you’re going to see Democratic governors continue to stand up against these SNAP cuts and do everything they can to protect people in their states,” Sam Newton, communications director for the Democratic Governors Association, said during a press conference Wednesday.
Several of the candidates who won governors’ races are already known for their attention to food and farming policy. Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-Minnesota), the current top Democrat on the Senate Agriculture Committee, won in Minnesota.
Deb Haaland, the former congresswoman and Interior secretary under President Joe Biden, who has talked publicly about relying on SNAP benefits to feed her children, won the governor’s race in New Mexico. Hannah Pingree, daughter of Representative Chellie Pingree (D-Maine), a champion of organic and local food, will be Maine’s next governor.
Voter sentiment on food issues
Overall, Republican candidates supported by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) Action did not do well. MAHA-endorsed Zach Lahn lost the Iowa race for governor to Democrat Rob Sand. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, another MAHA pick, lost his Senate race to Democrat James Talarico.
But some advocates said that some food and farm issues that appeal to many MAHA voters as well as Democrats and independents—like confronting corporate power to support small farms and food businesses and lower food prices—drove voter behavior in new ways.
“Rural America didn’t vote red or blue last night. It voted in support of independent farmers,” Farm Action Fund President and farmer Joe Maxwell said in a press release. “From Iowa to Florida, voters rewarded candidates who stood up to the meatpackers, the pesticide giants and the corporate lobbyists writing farm policy in Washington.”
In a statement, National Farmers Union President Rob Larew shared a similar sentiment. “This election season, family farmers and ranchers made themselves heard,” he said. “Now those who represent them must deliver.”
