An ominous voice intones, “Here in Washington, D.C., there are zombies living amongst us.”
So begins a video put out by the office of Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, the highest ranking Republican woman on Capitol Hill.
“The undead, continuing to live on long after they were supposed to have vanished from this earth. These zombies are government programs,” the video continues.
“They’re well past their expiration date, yet Congress still lets them feast. On government cash.”
Perhaps taking advantage of the popularity of TV’s “The Walking Dead,” McMorris Rodgers is hoping to end the little-known phenomenon of government agencies and programs continuing even though they are past expiration and have not been renewed.
The bill would cover both programs and agencies that are past their dates, including NASA, the National Institutes of Health, the National Weather Service and many Department of Veteran Affairs’ programs.
“There is a long list of programs that are being funded even though their authorization has expired,” McMorris Rodgers told the Washington Examiner about her Unauthorized Spending Accountability Act, or the USA Act.
“And that’s where elected representatives — on behalf of the people — need to be exercising the power of the purse, and taking the time to review and to take the appropriate action to ensure these programs are still on target, that they are fulfilling their roles, or if they need to be changed, or even not authorized in the same way,” she said.
Programs and agencies operating without authorization spend close to $300 billion per year together, according to a Congressional Budget Office report.
“I think moving forward what we do is ensure that Congress has to take that action,” McMorris Rodgers said. “Hold the federal bureaucrats accountable, because we’ve seen example after example of agencies becoming arrogant — that they’ve lost sight of their mission. This is a way we can hold them accountable.”
But holding Congress accountable may be difficult, says one critic.
“This is one of those laws that Congress sets up, that only applies to itself,” Kevin Kosar of the R Street Institute told CNN’s Jake Tapper in February. “So when it breaks its own law, who’s going to punish them?”
McMorris Rodgers is trying to.
She pitched the USA Act as part of a “bold conservative agenda” being pushed this year by House Speaker Paul Ryan.
“We’re building a bold, forward-looking agenda that restores power to the people,” said McMorris Rodgers, who has 38 co-sponsors. “[Congress] must restore its constitutional role, the Article I power of the purse, and this is one of the ideas I believe needs to be addressed.”
McMorris Rodgers is the chairman of the House Republican Conference, the fourth-ranking position in the House leadership, after speaker, majority leader and majority whip.
A prominent female lawmaker from the blue state of Washington, McMorris Rodgers delivered the GOP response to the president’s State of the Union address in 2015, and has been mentioned as a possible vice presidential selection in the 2012 and 2016 cycles.
In the Senate, the “zombie” issue has been raised briefly by Sen. Mike Enzi, R-Wyo., chairman of the Senate Budget Committee.
“Congress should re-examine what we’re actually funding in order to improve or eliminate government programs not delivering results,” he said last year.
