Ohio Democratic Rep. Shontel Brown made it official Thursday: she is seeking the top Democratic spot on the House Agriculture Committee, and she is framing her bid around rebuilding what she calls the broken traditional farm bill coalition.

In a letter to House Democrats, Brown, 51, criticized both the House-passed farm bill and the Senate version that cleared the Senate Agriculture Committee and awaits floor action. She argued the two bills "ignore real challenges like tariffs and [USDA] reorganization, all while further ripping apart the broad coalition that has always made farm bills possible."

"They would not only lock in dramatic cuts to [the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program] but again rob Peter to pay Paul by cutting roughly $1 billion in conservation funding," Brown wrote.

Her main competition is Rep. Jim Costa, 74, of California, who has publicly declared his intention to seek the ranking member post and has tried before. Costa sought the position in 2024 and lost to Rep. Angie Craig, D-Minn., who is leaving Congress after an unsuccessful run for her state's Democratic Senate nomination.

The two candidates cut sharply different profiles. Costa's district covers parts of Fresno and Tulare counties in the heavily agricultural San Joaquin Valley. Brown represents all of Cleveland and surrounding areas in northeastern Ohio, where she says one in five families relies on SNAP and access to healthy food remains a persistent challenge. Costa voted for the House farm bill, which passed 224-200; Brown did not.

"I believe the Agriculture Committee, like our country, is at an inflection point," Brown wrote. "For years, this committee was one of the few places in Congress where members with very different districts and priorities could come together, find consensus, and get things done. In fact, what drew me to the committee was that agriculture and nutrition were long united under a shared purpose. Today, that tradition has broken down."

The committee, she wrote, "works when agriculture and nutrition, producers and consumers, rural communities and urban neighborhoods, conservation and production, farm country and food banks are all at the table together."

Brown cited her committee tenure since entering the House in 2020. She served as ranking member of the General Farm Commodities, Risk Management, and Credit Subcommittee in the last Congress and currently holds the vice ranking member post under Craig. She said she has "built a reputation for maintaining relationships across our caucus, the farm bill coalition, and the aisle."

She has toured farm operations across Ohio as well as food banks, controlled-environment agriculture enterprises, and farmers markets. She has also traveled to colleagues' districts in Illinois, Georgia, Mississippi, Florida, Colorado, Hawaii, and beyond — visits she said reinforced that "Americans are increasingly frustrated with a system that feels like it is no longer working for them."

Brown laid out a three-part framework for rebuilding the coalition: affordability, accountability, and coalition-building. On accountability, she said Congress must "ensure USDA delivers what Congress directs, that farmers can access the programs we fund, and that USDA has the capacity to do its job."

Her letter took direct aim at input costs and market access. She criticized President Donald Trump over the war in Iran, now in its seventh month, which she said "has sent diesel prices spiking ahead of harvest. His tariffs have driven up equipment and fertilizer costs while triggering retaliation that has cost our farmers foreign markets."

She also flagged drought, wildfires, and other extreme weather, and accused the administration of "gutting critical forestry services." USDA's sweeping reorganization — currently being challenged in court — drew criticism for making the department "harder to reach and slower to respond" with "no accountability for how resources are being redirected."

Brown pointed to changes to SNAP under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, including a requirement that most states with payment error rates at or above 6% contribute to SNAP benefit costs.

"H.R. 1 is driving the largest SNAP cuts in the program's history," she wrote. "Five million Americans, including 1.5 million children, have already lost access to food assistance, and red and blue states alike are warning they can't absorb the next, larger round of cuts coming their way."

She tied her urban district directly to farm country interests. "What happens on a farm in downstate Ohio matters in Cleveland, just as what happens in my district matters to rural communities nationwide," she wrote.

The contest between Brown and Costa will test which vision House Democrats prefer for the committee: a San Joaquin Valley producer-state veteran, or a Cleveland-area lawmaker staking her bid on restoring the urban-rural coalition that historically passed farm bills.