[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 153 (2007), Part 18]
[House]
[Page 25554]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                         EARMARK IN SCHIP BILL

  (Ms. FOXX asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute.)
  Ms. FOXX. Mr. Speaker, yesterday the House passed a SCHIP bill that 
makes a mockery of the earmark rules. An already seriously flawed bill 
got worse when it became clear that we would be voting on a bill that 
had been given a sham earmark certification. Quite simply, this bill 
contained an earmark, despite receiving the earmark-free designation by 
the House Rules Committee.
  The House rules are clear. If a bill has earmarks, it must be 
identified accordingly. But, somehow, the Democrat majority shoehorned 
money for specific health care facilities into yesterday's SCHIP 
legislation and slipped it through committee.
  I don't doubt there are medical facilities that need funding, but not 
funding that bends the rules. Are the American people supposed to take 
proclamations about new ethical standards seriously? If anything, we 
are witnessing a new atmosphere of hypocrisy, a charade of openness 
that veils a status quo rife with secret earmark spending.
  This is not the way this House should do business. Let's get back to 
doing business the way the American people want, without secret earmark 
spending and with accountability for every dollar in every piece of 
legislation.

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