[Congressional Record Volume 167, Number 38 (Monday, March 1, 2021)]
[Senate]
[Pages S914-S916]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                            Budget Earmarks

  Mr. GRASSLEY. Madam President, the Appropriations Committee is 
reportedly preparing to announce the return of earmarks. That is a 
process that, around here, we know. People back home might not know, so 
let me explain that the process of earmarks inserts individual projects 
designated for specific interests into a bill, most often an 
appropriations bill. When I say ``individual projects,'' it means 
Senators doing it for probably their district or their State.
  Earmarks are a practice that has become a symbol to the American 
people of the waste and out-of-control spending in Washington. I am 
strongly against the return of earmarks.
  The earmark moratorium was implemented as a direct result of the 
events leading up to the election of 2010, and there was clearly a 
mandate coming from that 2010 election to do away with earmarks. So 
people sometimes think, through the elections or through contacting 
Congress, they don't have an impact. In this case, it had a very 
dramatic impact that has lasted at least until now, and hopefully it 
will last longer.
  The American people spoke because they were worried at that time 
about the country's growing Federal deficit and ballooning public 
debt--something we aren't as concerned about now as we were then and we 
ought to be concerned about more so now because the debt has more than 
doubled during that period of time.
  At that time, back in 2010, the debt was estimated to be 62 percent 
of gross domestic product.
  In 2009, President Obama and congressional Democrats passed a $787 
billion stimulus bill that was filled with wasteful spending, special 
projects, and unauthorized programs that completely violated the rules 
of the road for responsible governance.
  In September 2010--so at the time of the election I am talking 
about--in a Rasmussen poll, 61 percent of U.S. voters said cutting 
government spending and deficits would do more to create jobs than 
President Obama's proposed $50 billion infrastructure program. It was 
pretty evident, then, from people's opinion at that time, that the 
election of 2010 sent a clear message that the American people wanted 
Congress to stop wasteful spending. So it didn't take long for 
President Obama to get the message. He had a weekly address on November 
13, 2010, calling upon Congress to stop earmarks. He said: ``Given the 
deficits that have mounted over the past decade, we can't afford to 
make these investments''--in things like infrastructure, education, 
research, and development--``unless we are willing to cut what we don't 
need.''
  Now, I am going to give you a further Obama quote, and it is a fairly 
long one, but it is coming from a Democratic President.

       I agree with those Republican and Democratic members of 
     Congress who've recently said that in these challenging days, 
     we can't afford what are called earmarks. Those are items 
     inserted into spending bills by members of Congress without 
     adequate review.
       Now, some of these earmarks support worthy projects in our 
     local communities. But many others do not. We cannot afford 
     Bridges to Nowhere like the one that was planned a few years 
     back in Alaska. Earmarks like these represent a relatively 
     small portion of overall federal spending. But when it comes 
     to signaling our commitment to fiscal responsibility, 
     addressing them would have an important impact.
       We have a chance to not only shine a light on a bad 
     Washington habit that wastes billions of taxpayer dollars, 
     but take a step towards restoring public trust. We have a 
     chance to advance the interests not of Republicans or 
     Democrats, but of the American people; to put our country on 
     a path of fiscal discipline and responsibility that will lead 
     to a brighter economic future for all. And that's a future I 
     hope that we can reach across party lines to build together.

  Remember, President Obama said in 2010 that earmarks are bad. Unlike 
2020--today we are in even more dismal fiscal shape with even larger 
Federal deficits and a ballooning Federal debt. According to the 
Congressional Budget Office, the Federal debt held by the public stood 
at 100 percent of GDP at the end of fiscal year 2020 and is projected 
to reach 102 percent of GDP at the end of 2021.
  In other words, even though we have the largest economy in the world, 
we owe more than the entire U.S. economy is producing in a year. If we 
stay on this course, CBO projects that by 2031, debt will equal 107 
percent of GDP, the highest in the Nation's history.
  America cannot afford to go back to including earmarks in some ill-
conceived effort to grease the wheels to pass legislation only because 
it includes the pet projects of Members of Congress.
  While a small part of the budget--and I would have to admit, earmarks 
are a small part of the budget--earmarks can cause Members of Congress 
to focus on projects for their districts or States instead of holding 
government accountable and being fiscally responsible.
  Congress should follow regular order by authorizing funding for 
programs

[[Page S915]]

with very specific criteria. Legislation, including funding bills, 
should be passed on its merits, not on whether an earmark is included.
  Dr. Tom Coburn, former Senator from Oklahoma, said:

       Earmarks are the gateway drug to . . . spending addiction.

  There is an insatiable appetite for projects, and this leads to large 
bills weighed down with spending our country can ill afford, whether we 
are talking about appropriations or authorization bills.
  A Congressional Research Service--CRS, as we know it--study showed 
that from 1994 to 2011, there was a 282-percent jump in earmarks in 
appropriations bills. In the fiscal year 1994 appropriations bill, 
there were 4,155, and--can you believe this?--by 2011, that number for 
earmarks had risen to 15,887. Also according to the CRS, the total 
value of earmarked funds increased from about $35 billion for 6,000 
earmarks in 2000 to over $72 billion for nearly 16,000 earmarks in 
2006.
  Earmarks get out of control when there is no effective check on total 
spending, while at the same time, earmarks lead to overspending. 
Committee chairmen kindly say to the Members who have earmarks in bills 
or who want earmarks in bills: Are you going to vote for this 
appropriations bill if we put your earmark in? That sort of thing 
should never be a determination whether or not a Member votes for an 
appropriations bill.
  So you shouldn't feel pressured to support a vicious cycle of 
increased spending on bad legislation just because it includes 
earmarks, especially in this time of the pandemic. Congress should be 
focused on targeted spending to continue to help the American people 
who are suffering to recover, not finding ways to load up a bill with 
sweeteners that may be problematic on their own.
  According to a 2016 Economist/YouGov poll, 63 percent of Americans 
approve the ban on earmarks; only 12 percent disapproved.
  This quote by Citizens Against Government Waste President Tom Schatz 
to this publication, Just the News, makes a strong argument for not 
lifting the earmark ban. He said:

       Earmarks are the most corrupt, costly, and inequitable 
     practice in the history of Congress. They led to members, 
     staff, and lobbyists being incarcerated.

  You know, there are people who went to jail because of how some of 
this stuff was handled. In the form of legalized bribery, Members of 
Congress vote for tens or hundreds of billions of dollars in 
appropriations bills in return for a few million dollars in earmarks 
for their State or congressional district.
  Earmarks go to those in power, as shown during the 111th Congress 
when the 81 members of the House and Senate Appropriations Committees, 
who constituted 15 percent of Congress, got 51 percent of the earmarks 
and 61 percent of the money. Restoring earmarks will lead to the same 
result.
  I have heard the argument that earmarks are needed to pass bills in a 
bipartisan manner. I have consistently been ranked among the most 
bipartisan Senators by the Georgetown University Lugar Center. Check it 
out for yourself. I know from experience that true bipartisanship 
doesn't come from voting for legislation that I might otherwise have 
concerns about because an earmark or a pet project is included in the 
bill. True bipartisanship comes from reaching out across the aisle to 
reach consensus, even when there are disagreements on other issues, to 
really get things done for the American people.
  President Biden, in his inaugural speech, called for ``Bringing 
Americans together. Uniting our people. And uniting our nation.'' He 
also recognized that Americans have serious disagreements. Everyone 
knows that our country is deeply divided politically. I know from his 
time in the Senate that President Biden understands that people of good 
will can have honest disagreements about policy, so he knows that unity 
does not mean dropping deeply held beliefs and accepting his policy 
agenda. He said:

       Every disagreement doesn't have to be a cause for total 
     war.
       Disagreements must not lead to disunion.

  Real unity requires true bipartisanship and working together to 
discover what binds us together as Americans, even when we strongly 
disagree politically. Earmarks are not a way to bring this unity, and, 
in fact, would make this unity more difficult by attempting to paper 
over fundamental disagreements with window dressing while bypassing the 
real work of compromise.
  Now, in a similar vein, some people argue that earmarks are needed to 
help pass bills in a timely manner. In 2006, at the height of earmark 
spending in appropriations bills, only two appropriations bills passed 
on time. In the 10 years prior to the earmark ban, Congress never 
enacted more than four standalone appropriations bills on time.
  This holds true for reauthorization bills as well. Most, then, as you 
know the practice is, we just simply extend them for 1 fiscal year at a 
time.
  In the case of the past several highway reauthorization bills, which 
were notorious for earmarks before the earmark moratorium, all needed 
multiple extensions before they were signed into law.
  I have also heard the argument that article I of the Constitution 
says that Congress holds the power of the purse and that Congress has 
ceded its own power without earmarks. I agree that Congress now cedes 
its own power but not by not having earmarks. Rather, Congress cedes 
its power by failing to follow the budget process and stick to a 
budget.
  Now, the greatest sin: Congress can be fairly accused of lazy 
legislation by drafting vague provisions granting authority to Agency 
heads to work out the details, and most of those details are worked out 
through massive regulation writing.
  Congress can reclaim its legislative authority by including specific 
guidelines for implementing programs in both authorization and 
appropriations bills. Congress should regularly review Federal programs 
to ensure that funding criteria reflect the needs of the Americans and 
engage in robust oversight of Departments and Agencies to ensure 
congressional intent is met. Rigorous oversight and well-drafted 
legislation that clearly sets out congressional intent for how a 
program should be administered is the constitutional job of Congress.
  A good example of Congress not keeping the power of the purse and 
delegating significant authority to unelected bureaucrats at the 
programmatic level is the Affordable Care Act, sometimes called 
ObamaCare, which was rammed through Congress on a party-line vote. The 
text was around 2,700 pages long, but the regulatory implementation of 
ObamaCare required well over 20,000 pages. That is a bad way to 
implement public policy, particularly considering that the law 
redirected one-fifth of the U.S. economy.
  On top of the law are tens of thousands of pages of Federal rules and 
regulations administered by a score of Federal Departments, Agencies, 
and Boards. This isn't how our Founding Fathers envisioned Congress 
protecting the American people, and it is a bad way to do business.
  As a matter of fairness, earmark project funding should be merit-
based and competitive or allocated by formula. Earmarks undermine State 
decision making over funds that are allocated to States through 
formula-based grants. Political decisions should not preempt State and 
regional decision making. Earmarks should not be a shortcut for State 
and local governments engaging in long-term planning and budgeting for 
anticipated needs. And, furthermore, State and local governments and 
other organizations should not be spending time and money to hire 
lobbyists to chase after Federal dollars in hopes of getting an 
earmark.
  The money spent on lobbying and travel to pursue an earmark should be 
applied toward the local project itself. If a Federal Agency or program 
isn't working, then Members of Congress should fix it instead of 
seeking a carve-out. Highway authorizations bills are a perfectly good 
example of the problems with earmarks.
  In 1987, President Reagan vetoed the Transportation bill because of--
guess what--too many earmarks. That bill included only 152 earmarks. In 
1998, the Transportation bill, called TEA-21, included 1,850 earmarks. 
The State of Florida challenged the earmarks included for the State, 
arguing that the allocated funding did not address the actual 
transportation needs of the

[[Page S916]]

State. The U.S. Department of Transportation overruled Florida's 
objections.
  In the 2005 bill--so I am going to another Transportation bill; it 
was called the SAFETEA-LU--included 6,371 earmarks. Let's go over that 
again. Let's go back. In 1987, President Reagan vetoed a bill because 
there were only 152 earmarks. Ten years later, TEA-21 included 1,850 
earmarks and then, 2005, 6,371 earmarks.
  However, under the earmark ban, the last Transportation bill 
distributed 92 percent of the funding to the States through formulas. 
And then, you know, that gives States and local governments control 
over the funding decision based on the needs of the 50 different 
States, based on safety, engineering, and other objective criteria, as 
opposed to politically directed earmarks that totally sweep aside those 
criteria. It was almost a political decision where that money ought to 
be put.

  It should also be pointed out that the majority of the earmark funds 
in the past came straight out of the allocated formula dollars for each 
State, which then further eroded merit and State and local decision 
making. In other words, Washington politicians were making decisions 
better made by the nonpartisan boards in State capitols and local 
communities. And when I say ``nonpartisan boards,'' I don't suppose it 
is that way in all 50 States, but I know in most Midwestern States it 
is that way.
  I know that a lot of good has come from projects that I have helped 
support in Iowa, when we had our earmarks, and I certainly did not want 
Iowa to miss out on funding just because of a Washington dysfunction 
that we called earmarks. However, I also know that many of these 
earmarks disrupted our State and regional planning efforts. I have no 
way of knowing what good might have been done had we not had earmarks 
banned earlier. I do know that I have faith that the Federal money that 
goes back to Iowa for Iowans and the Iowans deciding how it is to be 
spent is being spent thoughtfully and well and not with a lot of 
political consideration.
  Any good that might come from my being able to direct small amounts 
of Federal taxpayer dollars to some worthwhile pilot project would be 
dwarfed by the negative effects of restarting the mad scramble for 
earmarks.
  So I hope, my colleagues, the rumors I have been hearing about the 
Appropriations Committee wanting to reinstitute earmarks, I hope that 
those people would pay some attention to the history of it and 
particularly pay attention to what President Obama said in 2010 about 
earmarks and not go through another process, maybe starting out with 
just a few earmarks but getting up into more than several years, more 
than 10,000 earmarks in various appropriations bills, and then all of a 
sudden then have a mandate that came from the electorate, like it did 
in 2010, and both Republicans and Democrats come back to these halls 
where we have debate and make policy, saying no more earmarks.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Connecticut.