Source:  RIta Jane Gabbett, MEATINGPLACE.COM, 6/9/10

Senate Agriculture Committee Chairman Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.) Tuesday night won a primary runoff election over challenger Lt. Gov. Bill Halter, enabling her to continue to campaign to keep her Senate seat in November.

Winning the tough-fought campaign clearly was a victory for her. What's less clear is whether that victory will have any effect on the speed with which the agriculture committee approves Elisabeth Hagen's nomination as under secretary of agriculture for food safety.

The nomination, announced in late January, languished until late May when the committee held its initial hearing on her confirmation. At that hearing Lincoln voiced her concern that USDA had yet to propose rules on catfish regulation as mandated by the 2008 Farm Bill. Arkansas is a leading catfish production state.

The committee must meet one more time to report Hagen's nomination out to the full Senate for a vote, but so far, that second meeting has not been scheduled. In fact, the next item on the committee calendar is a June 30 meeting, but it's not on Hagen: It's a reauthorization hearing to start work on the next farm bill.

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