. >> catherine boudreau talks about the farm bill. if you want to ask her questions, we have set aside the phone lines. democrats, 202-748-8000. and you can also post your thoughts on twitter at cspan wj. how much of a hurdle was the s.n.a.p. program, particularly the debate over increasing the work requirements for some on the program? >> for months, as the house and senate was negotiating the differences between their two bills, of course, the food stamp program was a major hurdle. and the problem on the senate side is just politics. i mean, they just didn't think they would have the votes to pass something that looked like the house bill. and also, a lot of democrats are flat out opposed to what the house is trying to do, essentially they wanted to impose stricter work requirements between 5 and 7 million people, and they wanted to do some tightening of eligibility criteria to qualify for the food stamp program. they wanted to pour billions of dollars into state education and training programs, and there was concern about the feasi

. >> catherine boudreau who reports on agriculture joining us for a discussion about the farm bill. thanks for your time. >> this is barbara glenn, the ceo of the national association of state departments of agriculture joining us to talk about agriculture policy and the farm bill. good morning. >> good morning, pedro. >> tell us a little bit about your organization, specifically what it does and your role in it. >> i would be happy to do so. i'm the ceo of the national association of state departments of agriculture. our mission is really to create consensus around sound agricultural policy. we do that between the state departments of ag, the federal government, and stakeholders. so pedro, our nmembers are the commissioners, secretaries, and directors of agriculture in all 50 states and four tear tors. in that role, they're the chief ag negotiator, a co-regulator with the federal government, also an agrucultural ambassador. >> you deal with policy decisions. does this farm bill being debated in congress in your mind a sound policy decision? >> we need a farm bill. yeah, this is goo

host: catherine boudreau is joining us on the farm bill. bill is an washington, d.c. caller: good morning, two points i want to discuss on this. first of all, i believe the food stamp program is the largest part of the agriculture bill. when this was going through , the houserlier passed some draconian restrictions and requirements for people to receive food stamps. things like you have to have a job, looking for a job. for a lot of places in the u.s., there are no jobs. or do have to be getting some education. food onho cannot put the table don't have money to go and get education. , the senate said we don't want these restrictions. it would cut $19 billion from the food stamp program if you put these restrictions in. so they said, no, we don't want that. but the house, who acted on it earlier, said we do want this. it would effectively take the food off the table of 2 million people, mostly women and children. right around christmas time. that gives you an idea of how compassionate these people are. is, do youestion think the senate will balk if the house once again

tuesday morning, we will discuss the latest on the farm bill and efforts to pass the bill with catherine boudreau. the national associative state department barbara glenn talks about agriculture policies and the new united states-mexico, canada trade agreement. and we will talk about the upcoming senate debate the final version of the 2018 farm bill with lisa blunt rochester, minnesota democrat senator and north dakota john hogan. be sure to watch c-span's washington journal, live at 7 eastern tuesday morning. join the discussion. ♪ >>> tuesday, the state department and the united states agency for international development officials testify on us policy toward china in the senate subcommittee hearing and live coverage begins at 10:30 am on c-span 3. also, the senate foreign affairs committee will host nomination hearings for the director general of the foreign service, the ambassador to yemen and the ambassador to australia. live coverage at 2:30 eastern on c-span 3. >>> c-span's live coverage of the state funeral for former president george hw bush continues as he lies in state in the us capito

. >>> joining us as political food and agriculture reporter catherine boudreau. how do they resolve the issue and what issues did they have to resolve to get to the floor for final passage? >> big will cost $67 billion over the past decade. and some of them sought to resolve the federal assistance program which is known as food stamps. as well as policy governor farm subsidies and and emerged as a last-minute hurdle, due to the california wildfires just recently. >> what are the issues that you have been writing about is the supplemental nutrition assistance program and in particular how paul ryan is selling his food stamp laws. in other words, they didn't get the work requirement system that members of the house and senate wanted in their. why didn't that make it in the final bill? this was a very politically contentious issue, especially in the center. democrats were very opposed to imposing stricter work requirements on millions of participants in the food stamp program. so, they wanted to reach a compromise that would make it through the senate. there is a 60