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New House budget plan unveiled

House Republicans unveiled their FY 2013 federal budget plan on Tuesday. Budget Committee Chair Paul Ryan’s plan would cut spending from $3.6 trillion this year to $3.5 trillion in 2013 and freeze it at that level for 2014 and 2015.

The plan would cut $33 billion from farm programs over ten years. In a statement, House Ag Committee Chair Frank Lucas said while “rural America, production agriculture and the House Agriculture Committee are willing to do our part in reducing the deficit,” he does not “support every detail and proposed cut” of the Ryan budget. Lucas cautions people “about reading too much into the numbers or policy proposals in either the President’s budget or the Ryan budget. They are only suggestions.”

Last year the Ag Committees submitted a plan to the Congressional Budget Super Committee which would have cut $23 billion from farm program spending.

Chairman Lucas says he has every confidence that with the bipartisan tradition of the House Agriculture Committee, they will “write a fiscally responsible Farm Bill that ensures Americans continue to have a safe, affordable, and stable food supply.”