For Immediate Release                        Daytime contact: Alexa Moutevelis 202-467-5318
March 15, 2007                                After hours contact: Tom Finnigan 202-253-3852 

The Porkers are Back:  Congress Fattens Up Emergency Supplemental

Washington, D.C. -- Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW) today criticized the House of Representatives for out-of-control spending and unrelated policy provisions in the emergency war supplemental bill (HR 1591).  President Bush requested $103 billion in emergency spending for operations in Iraq and Afghanistan and disaster relief.  The House Appropriations Committee included an additional $21 billion in the U.S. Readiness, Veterans’ Health and Iraq Accountability Act, 2007, that is being marked up today. 

“By passing earmark reforms, Congress signaled that it was serious about restoring fiscal responsibility to the budget process,” CAGW President Tom Schatz said.  “It seems the commitment to reform was short-lived, as Congress fattens up the emergency spending bill with special-interest goodies.” 

Below is a list of spending and policy provisions in the supplemental that are unrelated to military operations. 

$500 million for emergency wildfires suppression; the Forest Service currently has $831 million for this purpose;

$400 million for rural schools;

$283 million for the Milk Income Loss Contract program;

$120 million to compensate for the effects of Hurricane Katrina on the shrimp and menhaden fishing industries;

$100 million for citrus assistance;

$74 million for peanut storage costs;

$60.4 million for salmon fisheries in the Klamath River region in California and Oregon;

$50 million for asbestos mitigation at the U.S. Capitol Plant;

$48 million in salaries and expenses for the Farm Service Agency;

$35 million for NASA risk mitigation projects in Gulf Coast;

$25 million for spinach growers;

$25 million for livestock;

$20 million for Emergency Conservation Program for farmland damaged by freezing temperatures;

$16 million for security upgrades to House of Representatives office buildings;

$10 million for the International Boundary and Water Commission for the Rio Grande Flood Control System Rehabilitation project;

$6.4 million for House of Representative’s Salaries and Expenses Account for business continuity and disaster recovery expenses;

$5 million for losses suffered by aquaculture businesses including breeding, rearing, or transporting live fish as a result of viral hemorrhagic septicemia;

$4 million for the Office of Women’s Health at the Food and Drug Administration; and

A minimum wage increase, which is the subject of separate legislation.

Supplemental appropriations bills are exempt from spending caps and other budget controls, which makes them  magnets for projects and programs that might not stand up to the scrutiny of the budget process.  Members of Congress know that the President is unlikely to veto a bill that is meant to meet the needs of troops in the field.  The Senate version of the fiscal 2006 emergency appropriations bill included $700 million for the “Railroad to Nowhere” in Mississippi, but public criticism led conferees to remove that provision and others in order to pass a final version in line with the President’s request. 

“Members of Congress will pay a price if they go back to the usual pork-barrel politics.  Taxpayers must demand that Congress remove the waste and bloat from the final bill and stop the routine abuse of emergency spending,” Schatz concluded.

Citizens Against Government Waste is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization dedicated to eliminating waste, fraud, abuse, and mismanagement in government.

####