Obama budget draws fire from agriculture
Agriculture funding is not getting a fair shake in the President’s proposed 2013 budget, according to U.S. farm proponents. In the budget released Monday, President Obama proposed slashing agriculture subsidies by $32 billion over the next decade, just as Congress is getting set to create the new U.S. 2012 Farm Bill.
Obama’s plan includes eliminating the $5 billion a year in direct payment to farmers, an idea that has support among U.S. lawmakers, according to Reuters. In negotiations last fall, U.S. Senate and House agriculture committees identified $23 billion in proposed savings over 10 years.
Obama’s proposed 2013 budget is seen by some as unsupportive to agriculture- one of the top performing sectors in a struggling U.S. economy. “The President’s budget demonstrates that neither rural America nor fiscal discipline is a priority for this administration,” said Rep. Frank Lucas, R Okla., Chairman of the House Agriculture Committee. “Raising taxes on small businesses and ignoring the real drivers of trillion dollar deficits is a failure of leadership.”
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