House Agriculture Committee Chairman Frank Lucas (R-Okla.) led a successful effort on Wednesday to defeat a conservative attempt to double the food stamp cuts in the House farm bill, an effort that could have sunk the legislation.
Rep. Tim Huelskamp (R-Kan.) offered a conservative amendment to double the cuts to food stamps, bringing the total to $33 billion in cuts. It was defeated in a 13 to 33 vote, with 13 Republicans joining all the Democrats in opposing the additional cuts.
This spring, the committee endorses the same cuts in a bill intended to replace automatic defense and non-defense cuts slated to hit Jan. 2.
But Lucas and the other GOP opponents said they did not want to upset the “balanced” deal with Democrats this time around.
“We will have squandered one real chance of getting beyond the $4 billion in cuts in the Senate bill,” Rep. Mike Conaway (R-Texas) said.
The new cuts would end increases in food stamps due to the Obama stimulus package and shift training costs to the states.
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