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SENATOR MCCAIN STATEMENT ON THE EARMARK MORATORIUM AMENDMENT
March 14, 2008
Washington, D.C. – U.S. Senator John McCain (R-AZ) today submitted the following statement for the Congressional Record regarding the DeMint Amendment to the Senate Budget Resolution, which would impose a one-year moratorium on earmarks:
“Mr. President, I am pleased to lend my strong support for the amendment offered by Senator DeMint to impose a one-year moratorium on earmarks. I thank him for his leadership on this important, fiscally responsible proposal, and am pleased to join with Senators McCaskill, Coburn, Kyl, Corker, Burr, and Graham in cosponsoring the amendment. Additionally, Mr. President, I understand that my colleagues from Illinois and New York, Senators Obama and Clinton, have recently signed on as cosponsors of our effort. I welcome them to our cause.
“Mr. President, all of us in Congress should be paying very close attention to the current economic realities facing our country. Almost daily, we are informed of worsening news on the market front, widening subprime mortgage delinquencies, defaults, and foreclosures, declining housing values, and a broadening credit crunch affecting all sectors of the economy. Less than a month ago we passed an economic stimulus package in an effort to help avert an even worse situation than exists now. While I have long railed against wasteful pork barrel spending, now more than ever, we have got to establish some commonsense budgetary guidelines to live within our means, just like most American families are doing, tightening their belts and not wasting their money on “wants” to ensure they have the funds available to cover their “needs.” We need to follow their lead. The American public is counting on us to represent their interests, not the special interests, and to stop spending their hard-earned tax dollars on needless earmarks.
“Just over a year ago, in January 2007, 96 members of the Senate voted to fundamentally reform “business as usual” in Washington when we voted to pass S. 1, the Legislative Transparency and Accountability Act of 2007. I was very proud to support the passage of that bill because in addition to sound ethics and lobbying reforms, many which I had long-championed, the bill also included the most far reaching earmark reforms I had witnessed. Unfortunately, nearly all of the earmark reforms were gutted in the final version of the bill, causing a number of us to have to vote against its passage despite our support for some of the good reforms in the bill. We didn’t just miss the opportunity to address a broken legislative system of earmarking. The opportunity was purposely and deliberately scuttled by those who didn’t want real earmark reforms, and they are the ones that had the seat at the table when the final version was drafted. And as I recall, not one of those seats was filled by a member of the minority party.
“As a result, the earmarking practice continues, as proven by the more than 9,000 earmarks in the omnibus spending measure approved last December 18th— 3 months after S. 1 was enacted. Here is just a sampling of some of the earmarks that were included in the omnibus:
- $50,000 for the construction of a National Mule and Packers Museum in Bishop, CA;
- $100,000 for Cooters Pond Park in Prattville, AL;
- $625,000 for the Historic Congressional Cemetery;
- $1.628 million for animal vaccines in Greenport, NY;
- $477,000 for Barley Health Food Benefits in Beltsville, MD;
- $244,000 for Bee Research in Weslaco, TX
- $10 million for the design and construction of the Derby Dam fish screen in Nevada to allow passage of fish
- $1.786 million to develop an exhibit for the Thunder Bay National Marine Sanctuary in Michigan;
- $846,000 to the Father’s Day Rally Committee in Philadelphia, PA;
- $125,000 for International Mother’s Day Shrine in Grafton, WV;
- $470,000 for an Oyster Hatchery Economic Pilot Program, Morgan State University, MD;
- $446,500 for Horseshoe Crab Research, Virginia Tech, VA;
- $125,000 for the Polish American Cultural Center in Philadelphia, PA;
- $400,000 for the National Iron Worker’s Training Program;
- $350,000 for leafy spurge control in North Dakota;
- $1.725 million for the Hudson Valley Welcome Center in Hyde Park, NY;
“Clearly, Mr. President, when it comes to earmarking in Congress, it is business as usual, business as usual. And that is what drives me and other sponsors of this amendment.
“Not long ago, a prominent member of the majority party in the House, Congressman Henry Waxman, called for exactly what this amendment calls for: a moratorium on earmarks. Representative Waxman was quoted in the press as saying “We have a problem in Congress, Congressional spending through earmarks is out of control.” Congressman Waxman added “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.” Mr. President, you will not hear me say this very often, but I could not agree more with Congressman Henry Waxman!
“Mr. President, I encourage my colleagues to support this amendment. We need to start making tough choices around here - and we need to start today. We have to face the facts, and one fact is that we can’t continue to spend taxpayer’s dollars on wasteful, unnecessary pork barrel projects or cater to the special interests any longer. The American people won’t tolerate any more Bridges to Nowhere, and they shouldn’t.”
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