President Barack Obama signed a $410 billion spending bill Wednesday that will fund the federal government until the end of the fiscal year in September, and it includes 8,500 earmarks worth about $7.7 billion nationally.
The state of Wisconsin will receive 153 of these earmarks, which will total $102,978,050. Based on the state’s population of 5.6 million in 2008, each Wisconsin citizen will be taxed an estimated $18.30 to achieve this amount, according to the watchdog group Taxpayers for Common Sense.
Nationally, the state ranked 30th in terms of the number of earmarks received.
Earmark projects designed to benefit Wisconsin include improvements to airports throughout the state and more than $5 million to dredge the Green Bay Harbor.
Sen. Herb Kohl, D-Wis., ranked 18th on a list of the top 20 earmarking senators, with a total value of solo earmarks at $23,832,000, according to the group.
The large number of earmarks sparked controversy among both Democrat and Republican lawmakers throughout the country, including the president himself, who said the bill was left over from the administration of former President George W. Bush. He added the bill was necessary but imperfect.
Sen. Russ Feingold, D-Wis., praised the passage of the legislation but criticized the number of included earmarks.
“Earmarking circumvents that vetting process and ducks the tough questions taxpayers deserve to have asked,” Feingold said in a statement. “Rather than trying to fine-tune a fundamentally flawed process, we should take aggressive steps to prevent unauthorized earmarks.”
To help curb earmarks, Feingold introduced a bill co-sponsored by Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Rep. Paul Ryan, D-Janesville, to give the president the authority to line item veto specific parts of legislation he feels are unnecessary — like earmarks — to help reduce unnecessary spending by the federal government.
Republican Party of Wisconsin spokesperson Kirsten Kukowski criticized the bill in an e-mail to The Badger Herald, saying with $7.7 billion in pork barrel projects as well as increases in taxing, spending and borrowing, Congress clearly does not know how to spend American tax dollars wisely and should be held more accountable.
To reform the policy-making process and reduce the number of earmarks in future legislation, Obama announced changes in a nationally televised address, including requiring all proposed earmarks be on the representatives’ website and be discussed at public hearings. Earmarks designed to benefit private companies would also have to go through a bidding process.
The earmark reforms were praised by Democratic Party of Wisconsin spokesperson Alec Loftus.
“The reforms announced today by Democrats will increase executive branch review of earmarks,” Loftus said in an e-mail to The Badger Herald. “While Republicans continue to obstruct progress, President Obama and congressional Democrats today took action to move forward on earmark reforms.”
— The Associated Press contributed to this article.
