Sen. Feingold on Earmarks

Article continues below...

Offers Amendment to Cancel Old, Unspent Earmarks; Supports Year-Long Ban on Earmarks

March 11, 2010 -- Washington, D.C. – U.S. Senator Russ Feingold is once again leading the fight against wasteful earmark spending. Today, on the floor of the U.S. Senate, Feingold offered a bipartisan amendment to cancel old, unspent transportation earmarks, which could save taxpayers about $600 million right away and possibly billions more over time.

Feingold’s amendment was offered to a bill to reauthorize the nation’s aviation laws currently being considered by the Senate. The amendment, cosponsored by Senators Tom Coburn (R-OK), Sherrod Brown (D-OH), and John McCain (R-AZ), is based on a provision of Feingold’s Control Spending Now Act, his comprehensive legislation to slash the deficit by about one half trillion dollars through specific spending cuts and institutional reforms.

Feingold’s amendment would cancel transportation earmarks that are ten years old but have 90 percent of their balances unspent, including an estimated $626 million in highway earmarks. Secretary of Transportation LaHood has expressed support for Feingold’s proposal

"I am going to keep pushing this amendment because we can’t sit by and allow taxpayer dollars to continue to be wasted,” Feingold said. “We have decade-old earmarks on the books that are doing nothing more than tying up taxpayer dollars. Cancelling highway earmarks alone that have sat on the shelf for ten years would save at least $626 million in just one year. This is a commonsense measure, supported by both a Republican and a Democratic administration, and the Senate should pass it for the good of the taxpayer.”

Feingold took additional steps this week to fight wasteful earmark spending:

* Following reports that Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi was considering a year-long ban on earmarks, Feingold endorsed the proposal in a letter to Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.
* Today, Feingold cosponsored an amendment by Senator Jim DeMint (R-SC) to place a year-long ban on earmarks.
* Today, Feingold endorsed House Republicans’ self-imposed year-long ban on earmarks.

“I commend House Republicans for their year-long ban on earmarks and encourage House and Senate Democrats to do the same,” Feingold said. “But the Senate and House should go further and finally enact my bipartisan bill to fix the broken earmarking system, which breeds corruption and wastes taxpayer dollars. Taxpayers will be the winner if we can end this abusive practice.”

Source: Senator Russ Feingold