Will a New Farm Bill Be Finished by the End of the Year?
September 9, 2025 
The House Ag Committee Farm Bill logo. | House Committee on Agriculture
The current Farm Bill, officially known as the Agriculture Improvement Act of 2018, was passed during the first Trump administration. After being extended (for the second time) at the end of the Biden administration in December 2024, as part of the American Relief Act, the Farm Bill is now running out of time, with an expiration date of Tuesday, Sept. 30, 2025. At the time of writing, no solution has been reached.
With the deadline soon approaching, there is a lot of anxiety (and a lot of questions) from those within the agriculture community and industry, such as:
- What happens if the Farm Bill expires on Sept. 30, 2025?
- Will the Farm Bill be extended again?
- Will a new Farm Bill be ready in time?
We’ll do our best to briefly answer those questions.
What Happens If the Farm Bill Expires on Sept. 30, 2025?
If the Farm Bill expires on Tuesday, Sept. 30, 2025, it can still be revived at a later date. The same thing has happened twice now. The original 2018 Farm Bill expired in September 2023 and was later extended for one year in November 2023, to run through September 2024. It then happened a second time, as mentioned above, when it expired in September 2024, and was extended for one year in December 2024, to run through September 2025.
So, will the Farm Bill be extended for a third time?
Will the Farm Bill Be Extended Again?
If negotiations completely fall apart, it’s possible that another extension, for one or two years, will be passed. However, this is an option that many Republicans want to avoid, as the market and industry are on very different footing than even a year ago, due to the effects of tariffs, ongoing trade wars, and a multitude of other economic issues.
So, how are negotiations going?
Will a New Farm Bill Be Ready in Time?
The House Committee on Agriculture, led by Chairman G.T. Thompson (R-PA), is said to currently be drafting a new Farm Bill package. This iteration has been dubbed a “Skinny” Farm Bill due to many issues traditionally tackled by a farm bill already being addressed by the recent budget bill, also known as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. However, skinny or not, there are fears among industry leaders that negotiations needed to hammer out the fine details of the bill will be pushed into 2026.
With less than a month left before the Farm Bill’s expiration date, the pressure is on from many agricultural organizations and industry lobbyists, pushing and urging lawmakers to come up with a solution, and soon. The National Farmers’ Union announced its annual Legislative Fly-In, where discussion of a new Farm Bill will be a priority, and the American Farm Bureau Federation President Zippy Duvall recently spoke with Brownfield about the need for a modernized Farm Bill.
“It could be extended, of course, but I think they’re on track to try to get something done,” says Duvall. “And depending on who you talk to, some of them think it’s going to be pretty easy (and) some think it’s difficult.”
The aforementioned negotiations are proving to be much more challenging than they were during the previous Farm Bill drafting process, back during the first Trump administration. This is likely because of fallout from the passing of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act and its effects on the agricultural industry, which many Democrats view in a highly negative light.
While Republicans’ aim for the “Skinny” Farm Bill is to cover programs not reauthorized by the budget bill, Democrats want it to address the consequences of the budget bill as it pertains to the agriculture industry, and are otherwise likely to withhold their support. One prominent example noted by Democrats is the budget bill’s significant cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).
“I have been clear from the start that if Republicans cut the nutrition title of the farm bill, which is what we consider them having done, that it is going to be difficult to get 100 to 150 Democrats. Impossible,” says House Ag Ranking Member Angie Craig (D-MN).
If progress, as reported, is slow, then the passage of a “Skinny” Farm Bill will need to speed up significantly, as Thompson hopes to have the bill advance out of committee before the end of September, and have it passed before the end of the year, according to Politico. In a talk with Successful Farming, Thompson even suggested that tariff revenue could be used to fund farm aid for those impacted by current trade wars. However, with so much in flux during negotiations, it remains to be seen if such a proposal is at all feasible, let alone if it will make it into the “Skinny” Farm Bill.
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