Congress expands food stamps to farmers' markets, fresh local food
H.R. 6776 — Farmers to Families Act · Filed by Lauren Underwood (D-IL) · 3 cosponsors · Introduced Dec 17, 2025 · Referred to committee
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What it does
This bill amends federal child nutrition programs (WIC and related food assistance) to allow participants to use their benefits at community-supported agriculture programs, farmers' markets, and directly from farmers to buy fresh, local, unprepared foods. It requires states to process these payments through a single electronic benefits card within 18 months, establishes a federal technical assistance center to help farmers and markets accept these benefits, and creates a streamlined application portal so farmers can easily become authorized vendors.
Why we flagged it
The bill's core mechanism is expanding the vendors and food types eligible for federal nutrition benefits, with supporting infrastructure (technical assistance, payment systems, application portals) to make that expansion work. It is a straightforward public-health and food-access measure.
What the text implies
- Automatic authorization of farmers as vendors (Section 3) may create compliance and fraud-prevention challenges if USDA lacks capacity to monitor thousands of new small vendors; the bill does not specify audit or enforcement mechanisms.
- The 18-month timeline for state implementation of single EBT device and qualified payment device regulations is aggressive; delays could leave benefits inaccessible at farmers' markets during the transition.
The full analysis lists 5 implications of this text.
Who stands to gain
small and mid-sized farms; farmers' markets; community-supported agriculture programs