A week has passed since the mid-term election in the United States, in which approximately one third of the U.S. Senate seats were on the ballot.
That meant several members of the Senate Committee for Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry faced voters.
Some committee members will not return when the 120th Congress convenes in January 2027. Some of this turnover was expected, while other changes came as a surprise — to varying degrees.
Klobuchar departing
Perhaps the most notable change will be the departure of Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn. Klobuchar most recently served as the ranking member of the committee, because Democrats took the majority of the Senate, she would likely have become the committee chair under ordinary circumstances.
However, while Klobuchar’s Senate seat was not on the ballot, she was a candidate for governor of Minnesota. She won that race and will leave the Senate and the committee. Once she is sworn in as governor, she will have the unusual opportunity to appoint her own successor.
Marshall failed to secure re-election
As of the time of this writing, Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Kan., is the only committee member to have lost his re-election bid. Rather than give Marshall a second term, Kansas voters opted for the Rev. Adam Hamilton, his Democratic challenger.
In agriculture circles, Marshall was probably best known for taking a leadership position for the anti-Proposition 12 EATS Act. When it failed to advance and its successor, the Save Our Bacon Act, was proposed, Marshall initially supported it, but withdrew that support as he had concerns that the bill would give an unfair advantage to China-owned agriculture ventures.
Hyde-Smith’s status still unknown
Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith, R-Miss., faced a challenge from Democrat Scott Colom. As of this writing, she trails Colom by a narrow margin, and the race has not been called.
During the campaign, Hyde-Smith was asked about high beef prices. She responded that consumers had plenty of proteins to choose from. Colom turned that interview into a video ad that went viral and appeared to give his campaign momentum. The ad featured a series of voters saying they would rather pick another senator than another protein.
Hyde-Smith has been a member of the committee since 2018, after she was appointed to succeed the now-deceased Thad Cochran, who resigned at the time due to health concerns. She handily survived a 2018 special election challenge and a 2020 re-election challenge, both by former U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Mike Espy, who resigned from the Bill Clinton cabinet amid a scandal related to receiving improper gifts while in office.
Hyde-Smith is a former Mississippi commissioner of agriculture and commerce.
Others to depart
Sens. Dick Durbin, D-Ill, Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., Tina Smith, D-Minn., and Joni Ernst, R-Iowa., all chose not to seek re-election.
Those Senate seats will be taken by Juliana Stratton, D-Ill., Andy Barr, R-Ky., Peggy Flanagan, D-Minn., and Josh Turek, D-Iowa. Stratton is currently Illinois’ lieutenant governor, and Flanagan holds that same role in Minnesota. Barr is a member of the U.S. House of Representatives.
Sen. Tommy Tuberville, R-Ala., also opted against seeking re-election to the Senate, instead running for and winning the election for governor of Alabama. Rep. Barry Moore, presently a member of the House Agriculture Committee, ran successfully for Tuberville’s senate seat.
How many of the newly elected senators will be appointed to serve on the agriculture committee is not known.
Those to remain
Two committee members won their bids for re-election: Cory Booker, D-NJ; and Ben Ray Luján, D-NM.
The seats of 13 committee members were not up for a vote this cycle. Those include Sens. John Boozman, R-Ark.; Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa; Deb Fischer, R-Neb.; Jim Justice, R-WV; Jerry Moran, R-Kan.; John Hoeven, R-ND; Adam Schiff, D-Calif.; Elissa Slotkin, D-Mich.; John Fetterman, D-Pa.; Michael Bennet, D-Colo; Peter Welch, D-Vt.; Raphael Warnock, D-Ga.; and John Thune, R-SD.
Boozman is now the ag committee’s chairman.
Committee leadership
With Democrats gaining control of the Senate, it is known that Boozman will not continue as the committee chairman, but he is expected by most to become the ranking member.
With Klobuchar on her way out of the Senate, speculation has begun on who will be named chairman, with three names being mentioned most. Those are Bennet, Booker and Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio.
Brown, a former senator, won his race last week and will return to the Senate after a two-year absence. Because he served on the agriculture committee during his previous 18 years in the Senate, he could be seen as the Democrat with the most seniority.
Bennet also has seniority over other potential chairs, although his return to the Senate was once uncertain because he ran for governor of Colorado. He lost that race in the primary.
Booker’s name has come up less often than Brown’s and Bennet’s, although Marshall mentioned Booker as a likely committee chair during a debate with Hamilton.
What comes next
Committee assignments for the new Congress typically are not finalized until after senators are sworn in in January, when each party’s leadership sets its rosters. Whoever takes the gavel will help set the agenda on issues important to animal agriculture, including Proposition 12-related legislation, livestock and poultry disease response and the next farm bill.
