For years I’ve been railing against the egregious practice of earmarking in Congress. I led the fight against earmarks when it was a lonely battle, and after 10 years it’s great to see the new leaders in Washington have gotten the message. Both the House and Senate have instituted moratoriums on earmarks this Congress.
It’s true that earmarks make up only 1-2% of the federal budget, but earmarks leverage higher spending elsewhere. Once a Member of Congress has an earmark in a bill, they are obliged to vote for the bill no matter how bloated it becomes. A perfect example of this is the Medicare Prescription Drug Bill in 2003. In my entire time in Congress, this is without a doubt the worst bill passed by Republicans as it leveraged $11 trillion in unfunded liabilities on taxpayers. I am proud to say I voted against that bill but, unfortunately, earmarks in other legislation were used to secure the votes of enough congressmen to pass this new entitlement.
While I’m happy that we’ve sworn off earmarks in the 112th Congress, we still have much work to do to get on the right financial track.
