Jul 30, 2026
On June 23, 2026, the Senate Agriculture Committee released its draft of the next farm bill, with a markup expected in the coming weeks, and the current extension of the 2018 Farm Bill expiring on September 30, 2026. This single piece of legislation shapes who can own and keep farmland, who can access the programs that fund conservation on working lands, whether tribal nations are consulted on decisions affecting their territories, and whether millions of children and families can access food to eat. The America the Beautiful for All Coalition, comprising more than 300 organizations working to steward nature in a manner that upholds environmental justice and defends public health, is watching this farm bill, and we are calling on the Senate to write it for all of us.
Both the House and Senate versions of the next farm bill cut funding for the conservation programs that small and family farmers depend on as most of the nation experiences drought and historically low snowpack. The Senate draft cuts nearly $2 billion from the Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP), and the House version reduces EQIP outlays by $786 million over ten years, both redirecting the money elsewhere rather than meeting existing demand. These are the programs that help producers implement conservation practices on working land: cover crops, nutrient management, grazing plans, water protection. In 2025, only 24 to 37 percent of valid applicants to EQIP and the Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP) received contracts.
At our Legacy Lands Workgroup convening a few weeks ago, we were reminded of what this coalition holds together and what this bill threatens to pull apart. Kenya Crumel, Director of Black Land and Power Workgroup at the National Black Food and Justice Alliance and America the Beautiful for All Coalition’s Legacy Lands Workgroup Co-Lead, said: "Black and brown children are already one of the hungriest demographics in the United States, and the farm bill is about to make that worse. This is not just agricultural policy; it is a health bill. It determines who eats and who doesn't, whose water is clean and whose isn't, whose family keeps its land and whose loses it. Our coalition knows that food security, clean water, and land retention are not separate issues. They land on the same families, in the same communities, generation after generation. When Congress treats the farm bill as a bill for the few, Black and brown children pay the highest price."
The One Big Beautiful Bill Act, signed July 4, 2025, slashed $187 billion from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). SNAP feeds 42 million Americans. It is the single largest nutrition program in the country, and for rural and frontline communities, it is the difference between eating and not eating. More than 4.5 million people have already lost their SNAP benefits since the law took effect. The Senate Farm Bill draft does not address those cuts. The Farm Bill has historically been the vehicle through which Congress protects and strengthens this lifeline. This time, Congress has chosen to look away.
Neither bill addresses the gutting of the agency that delivers conservation to farmers. The Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) lost 23% of its staff between January 2025 and January 2026. The agency fell from 11,861 employees to 9,078, a net loss of nearly 2,800 staff in a single year. 141 counties that had NRCS staff in January 2025 had lost 100% of that staff one year later. The people who sit with farmers at kitchen tables, who walk the fields, who help them fill out the paperwork for the programs Congress authorized: gone. You cannot deliver conservation from an empty office. "We are watching the farm bill. Our coalition will be watching every line of this markup, and we will make sure the communities this bill has historically failed are heard before it becomes law," said Adrian Angulo, Program and Campaign Director at Nuestra Tierra Conservation Project.
What our coalition is watching for:
Nutrition. Address the SNAP cost shifts that push hunger onto states and children. A farm bill that deepens hunger is not a farm bill. It is a harvest of harm.
Access. Restore the land, capital, and market access infrastructure that was dismantled this spring. Programs on paper are not programs. Farmers reached are programs.
Heirs' property. Protect and strengthen the relending and title provisions that keep family land in family hands, because a deed problem should never become a dispossession.
Sovereignty. Honor tribal consultation and expand self-determination in every title. Consultation is nation-to-nation and government-to-government, before decisions are made, not after.
"Our communities in rural America steward the land and the water that feed this country, and yet the resources keep flowing past us to the biggest players. A farm bill that honors this land must honor tribal consultation, protect heirs' property, preserve our rural farming communities, strengthen local economies, conserve our natural resources, and restore what was dismantled this spring," said Anna Lee Vargas, Legacy Lands Workgroup Co-Lead, America the Beautiful for All Coalition.
Shantha Ready Alonso, Executive Director of America the Beautiful for All Coalition, said: "We call on the Senate Agriculture Committee to address the SNAP cost shifts that push hunger onto families and states, restore land and capital access for underserved producers, strengthen heirs' property protections, and honor tribal consultation and sovereignty in every title. Hundreds of our member and allied organizations are watching this markup. We will track what is included and what is left out. We will name who fought for these communities and who did not. This land belongs to all of us, and we will not let it be legislated away in silence."
We are watching the Farm Bill.
##
About Us
The America the Beautiful for All Coalition unites 300+ organizations across missions, ecosystems, communities, and cultures to steward nature while upholding environmental justice and defending public health. We follow the leadership of the communities closest to the lands, waters, and wildlife under threat.
Our coalition’s Legacy Lands Workgroup convenes to secure land access and stewardship for Black, Indigenous, and underrepresented communities.
For media inquiries, please contact our Communications Lead: Haleemah Atobiloye at haleemaha@cehn.org
