Washington, D.C. – Congressman Andy Harris, M.D., Chairman of the Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies Subcommittee on Appropriations, released the following statement after advancing the FY24 Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies Bill
Notably, this legislation:
- Supports our rural communities and strengthens our national security and food supply by continuing critical investments in agriculture research, rural broadband, and animal and plant health programs.
- Reins in wasteful Washington spending and bureaucracy by redirecting billions in the partisan bills that contained Democrats’ priorities (American Rescue Plan and Inflation Reduction Act) to help America’s producers and rural communities.
- Restricts the USDA Secretary’s discretionary spending authority on unauthorized, non-emergency programs.
- Directs USDA to focus hiring efforts in state and county offices to assist producers and rural communities, rather than continuing to bloat the DC bureaucracy.
- Protects the lives of unborn children including a provision that ends mail-order chemical abortion drugs.
- Prohibits the use of funds to promote or advance critical race theory.
- Directs the Secretary to take action to prohibit the purchase of agricultural land by companies owned by China, Russia, North Korea, or Iran.
- Includes a funding increase and direction for USDA to improve the tracking system for foreign land ownership under the Agriculture Foreign Investment Disclosure Act.
Congressman Harris issued the following statement:
“As Americans know all too well, our country continues to face record inflation driven by the over- spending of the Biden Administration. For fiscal year 2024, the Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies Subcommittee’s discretionary allocation is $17.8 billion. By redirecting nearly $7.5 billion in unobligated funds from the Inflation Reduction Act, this bill funds the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the Food and Drug Administration, and Commodity Futures Trading Commission with an effective allocation of $25.3 billion – a decrease of only two percent from this fiscal year, and an increase of $188 million above FY22 levels. We simply cannot continue down this path of providing large sums of money without regard to the fiscal future of our nation.”
Bill text is available here: