House Approves Earmark Reform

House Approves Earmark Reform

The U.S. House of Representatives today voted 245 to 171 to pass H.Res. 1000 and adopt earmark reform requiring the disclosure of the names of Members requesting all earmarks. The new rule will apply to both House and Senate bills and does not require action by the Senate or President.

Congressman Darrell Issa, a cosponsor of the rule change, explained that the new rule should ferret out questionable earmark requests and will hopefully curb requests for frivolous spending that waste taxpayer money.

"This new rule will create transparency in requests by Members of Congress in appropriations and other bills," said Issa. "Member requests in bills will now be required to stand public scrutiny. This scrutiny will expose conflicts of interest and other abuses that have previously been hidden in spending bills."

Last April, Rep. Issa voluntarily disclosed all 2006 Appropriations requests on his House website.

"Democratic rhetoric that this rule change does not go far enough is starkly disingenuous," said Rep. Issa. "Democrats have by-in-large refused to voluntarily disclose their own earmark requests, they have voted in-bloc against broader reforms that included earmark reform, and have desperately sought to thwart ethics reform."

http://issa.house.gov/index.cfm?FuseAction=PressOffice.View&ContentRecord_id=417&Region_id=0&Issue_id=0&CFID=23856943&CFTOKEN=69510613