Members of Congress are taking serious steps toward good-government reforms that would eliminate some of the more egregious taxpayer-funded perks they enjoy. The House of Representatives is poised to eliminate the lavish supports granted to former speakers of the House upon retirement, which include expensive office space and staff for five whole years after their departure from Congress.
Before the Memorial Day recess, the House Appropriations Committee unanimously approved an amendment by Rep. Kevin Yoder, R-Kan., to the 2019 legislative branch spending bill with language to cut off the benefit that has been on the books since 1970. The bill is expected to be considered by the House later in June.
The perk provides former speakers with office space, furnishings, franked mail privileges, and funds for office expenses and three staffers. It was first established for Speaker John W. McCormack, D-Mass., who retired in 1971 after serving in the House for 42 years. According to the Congressional Research Service, supporters of the perks argued that it was appropriate to “provide him the means to finish any Speaker-related business he felt necessary upon leaving Congress.” At first, these benefits were available for only two years, were later expanded in perpetuity, before being capped at five years in 1994.
The location of the office had been limited to the member’s district, until a 1985 law allowed it to be anywhere in the U.S. Otherwise, there were no other restrictions on the office or its rent except that it cannot be used for political purposes and is unavailable to any former speaker who takes a federally appointed or elective office.
The most recent beneficiary was former Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, who kept his office open for one year in the House Longworth Office Building at a cost of $211,000. Because Boehner stepped down midsession, the primary function of his office was to assist with the transition to incoming Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis. Since the inception of the benefit, former Speaker Newt Gingrich, R-Ga., has been the only speaker who declined it. He expressed concern that it “would get too cluttered with what’s private and what’s public.”
This was a problem with previous speakers. For example, the Associated Press noted that Carl Albert, D-Okla., (speaker from 1971 to 1977) used his office to “prepare speeches and help a friend on a book about the speakership.” An assistant in former Speaker Jim Wright’s office was quoted saying that the Texas Democrat “spends most of his time writing speeches for the former speaker and helping him work on a book.” Books about the speakership may be interesting, but there’s no reason taxpayers should be expected to fund their preparation.
In addition to curtailing these speaker office privileges, this bill would freeze congressional salaries for another year. Under law, members of Congress receive automatic annual cost-of-living allowance adjustments unless they vote to block them. Salaries have been frozen since 2009 at $174,000 for rank-and-file members, $193,400 for the House majority and minority leaders and the president pro tem of the Senate, and $223,500 for the speaker of the House.
The reform package is supported by the two people in the House who would stand to benefit from the perk: Ryan, who will retire at the end of the congressional session, and Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., a former speaker herself.
This effort comes on the heels of a bill introduced by Rep. Claudia Tenney, R-N.Y., which would cut off taxpayer-funded pensions for any member of Congress convicted of a felony. Whereas current law lets congressional felons collect taxpayer money until years of appeals are exhausted, Tenney’s bill would end pensions upon conviction and only restore them in the event of a successful appeal.
Neither of these efforts will, by themselves, save enough money to make a serious dent in our $21 trillion national debt. But, they are signs that Congress is at least getting serious about trimming some of the more lavish and indefensible taxpayer-funded perks they have enjoyed for too long.
Demian Brady is a contributor to the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential blog. He is director of research at the National Taxpayers Union.
