KPG to Congress: Remove the EATS Act from Farm Bill

The EATS Act language amounts to Right to Farm on a federal scale. Oklahomans already defeated this idea once. It was called SQ 777.

December 17, 2024

Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt, along with sixteen other Republican governors, wrote a letter to Congressional leaders on December 2, urging them to reauthorize the Farm Bill, which happens approximately every five years and is the legislative instrument that allocates funding for a wide swath of agricultural and food programs, including the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).

“Agriculture not only serves as the foundation of our economies, but it embodies our way of life. It provides food, fiber, and fuel that we all depend on every single day to survive. However, this crucial industry has faced powerful headwinds beyond its control,” the letter states.

Citing high inflation, input costs, and interest rates, increased natural disasters, regulatory uncertainty, and a growing agricultural trade deficit, the nation’s “outdated” Farm Bill, last reauthorized in 2018, has left America’s farmers and ranchers “operating under a framework that is no longer viable,” the governors wrote. “Since the expiration of the latest Farm Bill, conditions have dramatically changed; another year-long extension will leave farmers working under an outdated plan as they continue to face evolving challenges in today’s agricultural landscape.”

While the Farm Bill is not without its critics—like the nonprofit Food and Water Watch, which argues its policies favor large agribusiness corporations over families and independent farmers—it is a vitally important piece of legislation. The law should be updated to reflect post-pandemic needs across the nation.

However, as Kirkpatrick Policy Group wrote to Oklahoma’s Congressional delegation in response to the GOP governors’ letter, the new Farm Bill should not be passed without removing one potentially catastrophic provision that would deny the right of all Americans to maintain local control over our food and farms.

Tucked away near the end of the U.S. House’s 942-page Farm Bill is language taken from a previous standalone bill, the Ending Agricultural Trade Suppression (EATS) Act. While claiming to ensure the “free movement of livestock-derived products in interstate commerce,” this language aims to strip state and local governments of their right to craft agricultural production and manufacturing policies within their own borders.

Without this right, Oklahoma stands to lose critical market opportunities for independent farmers, community health and wellbeing protections, safeguards for our natural resources, and standards regulating animal welfare. If passed, the EATS Act language, or anything like it, would invalidate an estimated 1,000-plus state and local laws nationwide.

Remember State Question 777? In 2016, over 860,000 voters (60.29 percent) rejected that proposed amendment to Oklahoma’s constitution, which would have exempted agriculture and agribusiness from complying with state laws passed in 2015 or later without a “compelling state interest.”

The EATS Act language is Right to Farm on a federal scale.

Oklahoma voters knew better than giving a handful of multinational corporations free reign to conduct business with no thought to how their practices might negatively affect our home. Oklahoma’s 19-year-old federal lawsuit against the poultry industry alleging widespread pollution in the Illinois River Watershed exemplifies the need for common sense agricultural regulation.

KPG urges Congress to strike the EATS Act, or any similar language, from any extension of the 2018 Farm Bill and the next Farm Bill. Please advise your members of Congress to do the same.

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