Congressman McCaul Votes Against Billions in Deficit Spending
February 25, 2009
AUSTIN – At a time the government, more than ever, needs to watch what it spends, Congressman Michael McCaul (R-TX 10) voted against a budget bill filled with billions of dollars of wasteful spending. The $410 billion Omnibus budget bill is supposed to fund the necessities of federal government for the remainder of FY’09, but it includes more than $7 billion in pet projects.
“Here we are in the middle of the biggest recession in decades and we’re still throwing billions of dollars at luxury items,” said Rep. McCaul. “The American people are substantially tightening their belts. But the Democrats who wrote this bill don’t think the government needs to do the same.”
The bill, H.R. 1105, will grow government spending at more than double the rate of inflation and almost triple the rate of median growth in household incomes. The budget bill contains more than 8,000 earmarks at a cost to taxpayers of $7.7 billion. Among the special projects in the bill:
·$1 million to research red snapper in Florida.
·$100,000 for the Seals as Sentinels program in Maine.
·$7.1 million for the recovery of Hawaiian sea turtle populations.
·$1.9 million for the Pleasure Beach Water Taxi Service Project in Connecticut.
·$950,000 for a National Council of La Raza loan fund for “community development activities.”
·$5.8 million for an Edward M. Kennedy Institute for the Senate at the University of Massachusetts.
Congressman McCaul stopped requesting earmarks at the beginning of the last Congress because of the system’s lack of transparency and its susceptibility to waste, fraud and abuse. He also authored the “No Monument to Me” bill, which was signed into law last year, which prohibits naming government-funded military projects after sitting members of Congress. Rep. McCaul has filed a bill to extend the prohibition to all government funded projects.