WASHINGTON – House Republicans’ newly released farm bill proposal would undermine public health, environmental protection and food security, while handing sweeping new protections to pesticide manufacturers at the expense of children and communities.
The proposal fails to restore the deep cuts to SNAP, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, that Republicans and the Trump administration pushed through last year. The cuts threaten food access for millions of struggling families.
House Republicans also included an alarming and controversial provision that would erase state and local pesticide safety laws that protect people, especially children, from exposure to toxic chemicals at schools, playgrounds and parks.
More than 40 states, including Florida, Georgia, Illinois, New York, North Carolina and Texas, have adopted commonsense rules governing when and how pesticides can be sprayed near parks, playgrounds and schools. These safeguards reflect local conditions, public health science, and the voices of parents, educators and communities.
The House Republican proposal would wipe out those protections nationwide.
This move to block state and local authority is being pushed by foreign pesticide manufacturers, including Bayer-Monsanto and ChemChina. If enacted, this partisan bill would boost pesticide sales while limiting accountability when people are harmed from exposure to toxic crop chemicals.
The following is a statement from Geoff Horsfield, legislative director at the Environmental Working Group.
House Republicans can’t credibly claim to back an agenda that supports public health or protects kids while advancing a bill that weakens protections from pesticides and hands more power and profits to foreign pesticide manufacturers.Congress should not be in the business of stripping states of their right to protect children from toxic chemicals. This provision would silence parents, override local decision-making, and put corporate profits ahead of kids’ health.No parent should have to wonder whether the school playground is contaminated with pesticides. Yet that is exactly what this bill would force families to do.Rather than weakening protections for children, gutting conservation programs and denying nutrition assistance to hungry families, Congress should be strengthening safeguards that support public health, environmental sustainability and rural communities.
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The Environmental Working Group (EWG) is a nonprofit, non-partisan organization that empowers people to live healthier lives in a healthier environment. Through research, advocacy and unique education tools, EWG drives consumer choice and civic action.
