II 118THCONGRESS 1 STSESSION S. 2578 To amend the Emergency Food Assistance Act of 1983 to allow certain States to directly purchase commodities, and for other purposes. IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES JULY27, 2023 Ms. H IRONOintroduced the following bill; which was read twice and referred to the Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry A BILL To amend the Emergency Food Assistance Act of 1983 to allow certain States to directly purchase commodities, and for other purposes. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-1 tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 2 SECTION 1. DIRECT PURCHASE OF COMMODITIES. 3 Section 202 of the Emergency Food Assistance Act 4 of 1983 (7 U.S.C. 7502) is amended by inserting after 5 subsection (a) the following: 6 ‘‘(b) D IRECTPURCHASE OFCOMMODITIES.— 7 ‘‘(1) D EFINITIONS.—In this subsection: 8 ‘‘(A) E LIGIBLE STATE.—The term ‘eligible 9 State’ has the meaning given the term in sec-10 VerDate Sep 11 2014 22:27 Aug 14, 2023 Jkt 039200 PO 00000 Frm 00001 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S2578.IS S2578 kjohnson on DSK79L0C42PROD with BILLS 2 •S 2578 IS tion 4206(b) of the Agriculture Improvement 1 Act of 2018 (7 U.S.C. 7518(b)). 2 ‘‘(B) E NTITLEMENT FUNDS .—The term 3 ‘entitlement funds’, with respect to an eligible 4 State, means the dollar amount used by the 5 Secretary to purchase commodities pursuant to 6 section 27 of the Food and Nutrition Act of 7 2008 (7 U.S.C. 2036) to distribute to the eligi-8 ble State in accordance with section 214. 9 ‘‘(2) D IRECT PURCHASE.—The Secretary shall 10 allow an eligible State to elect to receive all of the 11 entitlement funds of the eligible State as cash to 12 make direct purchases of commodities through the 13 private commercial marketplace.’’. 14 Æ VerDate Sep 11 2014 22:27 Aug 14, 2023 Jkt 039200 PO 00000 Frm 00002 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6301 E:\BILLS\S2578.IS S2578 kjohnson on DSK79L0C42PROD with BILLS