Rob Portman, President Bush’s man running the Office of Management and Budget, issued a memo today to heads of federal departments and agencies instructing them in plain language to ignore telephone calls from congressmen or their staffs seeking earmarks, as well as earmarks contained in congressional committee bill reports.
The key sentences in the memo, which you can read here, are these:
“For agencies funded by the Continuing Resolution, this means that unless a project or activity is specifically identified in statutory text, agencies should not obligate funds on the basis of earmarks contained in Congressional reports or documents, or other written or oral communications regarding earmarks.
“While the Administration welcomes input to help make informed decisions, no oral or written communication concerning earmarks shall supersede statutory criteria, competitive awards, or merit-based decision-making, as set forth in Section II below.”
Ed Frank and Americans for Prosperity says the OMB memo is a big victory for taxpayers because it means the congressional favor factory is now officially closed.
Sen. Jim DeMint thinks it’s a big victory, too, noting in a statement:
“The President handed American taxpayers a huge victory today by stopping all of the backdoor earmarks Congress requests hidden in reports and through secret emails and phone calls. Government agencies now have clear instructions to ignore these congressional earmarks which do not have the force of law.
“Federal agencies can now use these funds to advance their core missions and serve true national priorities. Without this guidance from the President, thousands of wasteful earmarks worth billions of dollars could have continued even though they were never actually written in our bills or signed into law.”
Sen. Tom Coburn – the Oklahoma Republican who started the campaign against earmarks by taking on one of the Senate’s toughest old bulls – also praised Bush but added the politically more significant observation that credit goes to a citizens movement led by bloggers:
“For the past twenty years earmarks have been the gateway drug to spending addiction in Congress. I applaud President Bush for helping members of Congress to ‘just say no’ to earmarks. The President’s bold move will help eliminate thousands of earmarks Congress voted to continue this week.
“I also applaud the army of concerned citizens and bloggers who, through the force of persistence and plain common sense, have forced the political establishment to do a 180-degree turn on earmarks. I look forward to working with these concerned citizens to ensure that Congress overcomes its dependence on earmarks.”
