Sen. Boozman Sends Letter on COVID-19 Relief Accountability

This week Sen. John Boozman (R-AR), a Ranking Member of the Agriculture Committee, sent a letter to Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack raising concerns over the use of unobligated COVID-19 funds for unauthorized purposes. In the letter, the Senator requested an accounting of the $11 billion of support provided in relief through the FY21 appropriations bill. The letter can be found here.

House Members Introduce MAP and FMD Program Expansion Bill

This week, a bipartisan group of six members of the House of Representatives introduced the Supporting Market Access to Reinvigorate Trade (SMART) Act. This bill would increase the funding available for the Market Access Program (MAP) and the Foreign Market Development (FMD) Programs. These Department of Agriculture programs help support new market creation for American agricultural products. This bill was originally introduced by Reps. Jim Costa (D-CA), Jimmy Panetta (D-CA), Cindy Axne (D-IA), Dan Newhouse (R-WA), Kim Schrier (D-WA), Tracey Mann (R-KS), and Ashley Hinson (R-IA).