Earmarks are experiencing an unfortunate revival in Washington. After House Republicans failed to extend a 2011 moratorium on congressmen tacking home-state projects on to spending bills, Congress oversaw a surge in earmarked spending with the passage of the Bipartisan Budget Act earlier this year.
The 2018 Congressional Pig Book, released on Wednesday by the think tank and advocacy group Citizens Against Government Waste, documents the government’s ballooning excess and waste. In fiscal year 2018, the number of earmarks passed by Congress increased by 42.3 percent since FY 2017, totaling $14.7 billion in costs — a 116.2 percent increase.
CAGW notes some costly examples: $65 million for the Pacific coastal salmon recovery; more than $2.6 billion for the notoriously behind-schedule F-35 Joint Strike Fighter aircraft program, which already exceeds $406 billion in total costs; nearly $860 million for Army Corps of Engineers projects; $210 million for the National Predisaster Mitigation Fund; and $663,000 for a brown tree snake eradication program in Hawaii.
During the years of the moratorium, earmarks cost an average of $3.7 billion dollars annually. With the recent rate increase in earmarked spending, the costs could surpass the 2006 record of $29 billion in just two years.
Aside from enabling more corruption, as congressmen can exchange votes for earmarked spending to their respective districts, the CAGW notes that earmarks promote an inequitable allocation of funding: During the 111th Congress, “the 81 House and Senate appropriators, or 15 percent of Congress, had 51 percent of the earmarks and 61 percent of the money.”
The recent increase in earmarked spending can be brushed off as politics as usual. But if House Republicans want to retain any credibility as the party of fiscal responsibility, enforcing the moratorium on earmarks wouldn’t be a bad idea.
Cole Carnick is a commentary intern with the Washington Examiner.
