Source: POLITICO'S MORNING AGRICULTURE, 8/24/20

House Agriculture Chair Collin Peterson (D-Minn.) is questioning how the Agriculture Department determined which crops and livestock were eligible for aid under the $16 billion direct payment program. In a letter to Perdue, he asked for greater transparency and suggested that the department’s time window for measuring the impact on commodity prices didn’t align with when many ag sectors suffered their most significant price losses.

Related: USDA today will publish a rule in the Federal Register to modify the eligibility requirements for farm payments, such as allowing first cousins, nieces and nephews of farm owners to qualify as family members — a change directed by the 2018 farm bill. But it also tightens some other requirements for anyone claiming to be actively engaged in running a farm, as Agri-Pulse points out.