Sugar producers score victory in Congress as House protects farm bill subsidies

Sugar growers scored a sweet victory on Capitol Hill over big candy and soda manufacturers on Thursday as Louisiana lawmakers and other opponents easily sent a proposal to gut sugar subsidies down to a bitter defeat.

The familiar battle over federal programs to prop up sugar prices had appeared to be a key conflict in the contentious congressional effort to pass the farm bill, a sprawling once-every-five-years package of federal agricultural subsidies and nutritional programs.

Republican Reps. Ralph Abraham of Alto, Garret Graves of Baton Rouge, Clay Higgins of Port Barre and Mike Johnson of Bossier all said they might turn on the farm bill if changes were made to the sugar program. Majority Whip Steve Scalise, a Jefferson Parish Republican, worked to kill Foxx’s amendment.

“If it were free market globally, we could have a different discussion,” said Abraham, Louisiana’s sole member of the Agriculture Committee and a farmer himself. “So many other countries subsidize their farmers so much that it’s not a level playing field.”

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