PORTFOLIO Checks & Balances By Mark Scanlan, ICBA Farm bill feat Community banks rose to the challenge of a farm bill passage. ne of the biggest unanswered questions going into 2018 was whether Congress would overcome the partisan and policy hurdles necessary to adopt a new farm bill. Community bankers and the agricultural community had been told for most of the year that the most likely outcome would be a one-year extension, thus pushing the legislation's enactment into the 116th Congress. But not only did Congress close out the year 40 Q ICBA Independent Banker Q February 2019 O by delivering a farm bill, it did so by historic margins. In December, the Senate voted 87-13 in favor of the ICBA-backed Agriculture Act of 2018, and the House passed it 369-47, sending it to the president for his signature on Dec. 20. But that doesn't mean the process was easy. The House passed the farm bill in June by just two votes a month after voting it down on the House fl oor. Immigration politics and a lack of Democratic support for food-stamp work requirements disrupted the bill's progress, but ultimately House and Senate ag leaders hashed out a fi nal bill. Mark Scanlan (mark.scanlan@ icba.org) is ICBA's senior vice president of agriculture and rural policy