10. Department of Agriculture · Notable · Needs Congress
Require prior congressional approval before CCC funds are spent
Printed page 295 10. Department of Agriculture
“While not an ideal solution, Congress could also amend the Charter Act to require prior congressional approval through duly enacted legislation before any money is spent.”
What has happened
- Not started
No bill in the 119th Congress touches section 5 of the CCC Charter Act except to widen it: the House-passed farm bill (H.R. 7567, 224-200 on 2026-04-30) contains Sec. 1012, "Restoration of tobacco as agricultural commodity in Commodity Credit Corporation Charter Act", which strikes "(other than tobacco)" from section 5 each place it appears — an expansion of the same discretion. Meanwhile the executive used the authority for $11 billion in Farmer Bridge Assistance payments (CCC final rule, 2026-02-23) and again for the specialty-crop program (2026-06-01). Bill-title searches over the 119th-Congress Corpus for "Commodity Credit", "Charter Act" and "slush" return only an unrelated biofuel-feedstock amendment (H.R. 8762, referred to committee) and a family of settlement-"slush fund" bills with no CCC content. Cluster B (CCC Charter Act section 5) in `docs/research/ch-10.md`, round 3 ticket 09 batch 09c, records the queries.
- H.R. 7567, Farm, Food, and National Security Act, engrossed in the House 2026-04-30 — Sec. 1012 widens CCC Charter Act section 5 by restoring tobacco as a covered commodity
- CCC final rule: Farmer Bridge Assistance (FBA) Program — $11 billion in payments under section 5(b) of the CCC Charter Act (15 U.S.C. 714c(b))
Research log
What was searched, and what didn’t count as evidence
Research notes
- One negative search covers the whole CCC cluster (#762-#767); the executive-side ask is #761.
- H.R. 8762 (“To amend the Commodity Credit Corporation Charter Act to exclude crops used to produce biofuel with respect to an agricultural commodity”, referred to House Agriculture 2026-05-12) is the only other Charter Act bill; it is a commodity-definition change, not a limit on section 5 discretion, and in any event a bill that has only been introduced leaves the ask not started.
- H.R. 7567’s Sec. 1012 text was read in the engrossed bill at govinfo.
- Action
- restrict
- Object
- Commodity Credit Corporation Charter Act
- ID
- 763