Fox News: Amid soaring inflation, skyrocketing gas prices, Congress brings back earmarks: ‘Cocaine of this generation’
March 18, 2022While Americans struggle with soaring inflation and record-setting gas prices, Congress’ $1.5 trillion omnibus spending bill includes scores of earmarks that dole out millions upon millions of taxpayer dollars to lawmakers’ pet projects.
Originally taken down during the Republican Tea Party wave during former President Obama’s administration, earmarks were used for decades to give lawmakers a loophole to fund pet projects back home.
The appropriations screen pass was brought back this year by Congress, as Democrats and some Republicans used thousands of earmarks in the $1.5 trillion omnibus bill to get millions of dollars in taxpayer money to fund projects back home in their districts.
From $584,000 for “a self-reliant urban solar village” in Pennsylvania to a $300,000 Hawaiian tree census, here are some states where lawmakers bought items with your tax cash in the hastily passed appropriations omnibus bill last week that also included nearly $13 billion in aid for war-torn Ukraine.