House Republicans scored a significant victory in their war on earmarks today when influential Democrat Rep. Henry Waxman, chairman of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee, broke with party leaders to call for an immediate moratorium on earmarks in 2009 spending bills. I think our best approach would be to suspend all earmarks for the 2009 appropriations cycle while we consider the right reforms for the earmark process. As a result, I will not submit any requests to the Appropriations Committee for this fiscal year. I look forward, however, to …
Facing a potentially embarrassing defeat on earmarks tomorrow, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi finally decided to say something about Republicans’ request for an immediate earmark moratorium. In a letter to Minority Leader John Boehner tonight, Pelosi makes several misleading or downright inaccurate claims about the Democrats’ attempts to curtail earmarks. The letter arrived only after Boehner and Whip Roy Blunt promised a showdown over earmarks tomorrow on a bill to reauthorize a higher education program. Boehner and Blunt had grown frustrated by Pelosi’s unwillingness to even reply to their request for …
House Republican leaders were serious when they promised to hold Democrats accountable for ignoring the request for an immediate earmark moratorium. The first test will come tomorrow when Minority Leader John Boehner and Whip Roy Blunt plan to force an earmark reform vote on the higher education authorization bill. The legislation, which would reauthorize the Higher Education Act, is viewed by taxpayer watchdogs as a slush fund for colleges and universities. Boehner said it would serve as a good opportunity to put politicians to the test on earmarks. It’s become …
House Minority Leader John Boehner and his colleagues in the Republican leadership gave Speaker Nancy Pelosi a deadline of Feb. 1 to respond to their request for an immediate moratorium on earmarks. The date came and went without a word from Pelosi or her Democrat colleagues. But don’t expect to hear the end of it just yet. Boehner released a statement today attacking Pelosi for failing to take a stand against wasteful pork-barrel spending, which he said has become a “symbol of a broken Washington.” He said Pelosi could shut …
President Bush may have promised to veto any spending bill that does not cut the number and cost of earmarks in half, but as commentators were quick to point out, since Democrats are planning on holding back spending bills till the next President takes office, the threat is virtually worthless. Equally unhelpful is the White House’s Executive Order directing federal agencies to ignore future earmarks included in committee reports but not in the voted on legislation. The next President could issue a new Executive Order his (or her) first second …
President Bush’s decision to challenge lawmakers on earmarks comes only days after House Republicans made their own pledge to give up pork projects. At their retreat last Friday in West Virginia, House GOP leaders released a letter calling on Speaker Nancy Pelosi to issue an immediate moratorium on earmarks and to appoint a bipartisan, bicameral joint committee to reform the earmark process and eliminate wasteful spending. The two moves, while not as aggressive as some conservatives had hoped, refocus attention on an issue that has tarnished the image of Congress …
