The top Senate appropriator Thursday took a jab at the House after both parties in the lower body announced separate bans on earmarks.
Senate Appropriations Chairman Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii), in a news release that listed a series of Senate measures aimed at transparency and fiscal responsibility, seemed to belittle the House appropriations process for producing a slew of alleged ethical mishaps.
“I understand the reasons why the House might feel it is necessary to adjust its practices in light of previous problems in that body,” Inouye said in the news release. “The policies that the Appropriations Committee has adopted for the Senate safeguard the Senate’s constitutional role in directing spending decisions while ensuring transparency and strict control on the practice of earmarking. In limiting earmarks to less than one percent of discretionary spending, we ensure that the excesses of the past will not be repeated.”
House Republicans and Democrats instituted bans of their own on earmarks, aimed at reigning in spending and improving the damaged public appearance of the committee. Republicans banned all earmarks for a year while Democrats forbade member-directed spending items for for-profit corporations.
The Senate has signaled it will institute neither ban.
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