Farm Credit System gets new rural infrastructure lending power
H.R. 1246 — Investing in Rural America Act of 2025 · Filed by Michelle Fischbach (R-MN) · 26 cosponsors · Introduced Feb 12, 2025 · Referred to committee
Your members of Congress
Enter a ZIP to see where your representative and both senators stood on this bill.
Looked up on this device — your ZIP is never stored on our servers.
What it does
This bill amends the Farm Credit Act to allow Farm Credit System institutions (specialized lenders serving agriculture and rural areas) to finance essential community facilities like water systems, broadband, and healthcare facilities in rural areas—work previously limited to USDA programs. The institutions must offer co-lending partnerships to community banks and cap such lending at 15% of their portfolio, with annual reporting to Congress.
Why we flagged it
The bill's core function is to expand the lending authority of Farm Credit System institutions into essential community facilities financing, a straightforward expansion of their charter to serve rural development needs alongside agricultural lending.
What the text implies
- Shifts some rural infrastructure financing from USDA direct lending to Farm Credit System institutions, potentially reducing USDA's role and budget pressure in this space.
- Co-lending requirement and community bank priority may create administrative overhead for Farm Credit institutions but could strengthen rural banking ecosystem by forcing partnerships.
- 15% portfolio cap means Farm Credit institutions will not become dominant players in rural community facility financing, preserving space for USDA and other lenders.
- Annual reporting requirement creates transparency but also establishes a new federal monitoring obligation for Farm Credit Administration.
Who it affects
Rural residents gain expanded access to capital for critical infrastructure (water, broadband, healthcare facilities) through a new lending channel, while safeguards (15% cap, co-lending requirement, community bank priority) prevent concentration of risk and preserve competition among rural lenders.
Who stands to gain
- Farm Credit System institutions
- Community banks in rural service areas
- Rural infrastructure developers and contractors
Named in the bill
Farm Credit System, Farm Credit Bank, Direct lender association, Bank for cooperatives, Farm Credit Administration, USDA, Consolidated Farm and Rural Development Act section 306, House Committee on Agriculture, Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry
Where it stands
26 cosponsors: 15 Republicans, 11 Democrats.
- Feb 12, 2025 — Introduced · Congress.gov: “Introduced in House”
- Feb 12, 2025 — Referred to House Committee on Agriculture · Congress.gov: “Referred to the House Committee on Agriculture”
Dates and quoted wording are Congress.gov's action record; the timeline shows status changes, not every procedural step.
Money around this bill
7 lobbying clients named this bill on 11 disclosure filings across 3 quarters, Dec 2025 to Jun 2026. Those filings disclosed $1,510,000 in lobbying spend. A filing names 8 bills on average, so that figure is what each filing reported, not a share belonging to this bill.
More lobbying clients named this bill than 86% of bills with at least one filing.
Michelle Fischbach, the sponsor, reported $832,550 in PAC receipts in the 2026 cycle.
- Cobank Acb — $580,000 on 2 filings
- American Psychological Association Services Inc.(fka American Psychological Assn — $340,000 on 1 filing
- Farm Credit Council — $250,000 on 2 filings
- Farm Credit Bank of Texas — $160,000 on 2 filings
- American Agcredit, Flca — $100,000 on 2 filings
Lobbying Disclosure Act filings through Jul 20, 2026. A filing shows who paid to lobby on a bill it names, not what changed.
How this was measured
Analysis — Quorum's AI read the full bill text on Jun 8, 2026; transparency and hidden-provision scores are compared against the median of 16,222 analysed bills.
Status and sponsors — Congress.gov's bill record — actions, committee referrals and cosponsors — loaded nightly. The timeline shows status changes, not every procedural action.
Money — Senate Lobbying Disclosure Act filings whose specific-issue field names this bill for quarters ending Dec 2025 to Jun 2026. A filing's amount is reported whole beside the median number of bills a filing names; it is never divided across them. PAC receipts are FEC-reported contributions to the sponsor's candidate committee in the 2026 cycle.
As of — lobbying records through Jul 20, 2026 · page rendered 2026-10-20.
“Farm Credit System gets new rural infrastructure lending power” QuorumCivic. https://share.quorumcivic.app/bill/119/hr1246 Report an error
The week in bills
One email, Sunday: what Congress passed, what it changed, and who paid.
One link arrives to confirm the address. It is used for this email and nothing else, and every issue carries an unsubscribe link.