[Congressional Record Volume 155, Number 34 (Thursday, February 26, 2009)]
[House]
[Page H2838]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




               EARMARKS ARE ESSENTIALLY NO-BID CONTRACTS

  (Mr. FLAKE asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute.)
  Mr. FLAKE. Mr. Speaker, yesterday we passed an omnibus spending bill 
with more than 8,600 earmarks. Many of them are simply wasteful, 
including 1.8 million to combat swine odor in Iowa. Maybe that could 
have been spent a little closer to home.
  But a lot of these earmarks, a few thousand of them, have the 
potential to be far more damaging to this institution because they are 
essentially no-bid contracts. In many cases, they're no-bid contracts 
to those who turn out to be campaign contributors to Members who 
secured the no-bid contract.
  We have to ask ourselves, is this proper for the House to do? Should 
the House of Representatives allow its Members to award no-bid 
contracts to their campaign contributors? It doesn't seem right, Mr. 
Speaker. We owe this institution far better than that, and we ought to 
stop the practice.

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