White House: Dems might need 12 steps for earmarks

The Democratic Congress might need a “12-step group to deal” with its earmarks addiction, White House Press Secretary Tony Fratto said Friday, the second day in a row that the administration attacked pork in the omnibus spending bill Congress cleared this week.

{mosads}Fratto made the quip in response to a question at Friday’s White House informal press conference, according to a transcript posted online. “They took the first step of admitting that they have a problem. I think one of the other steps is you have to make amends.”

Fratto said the Congress has made some progress on earmarks, but said more needs to be made in the next year.

Fratto’s comments come one day after President Bush used a press conference to criticize Congress for approving hundreds of earmarks worth hundreds of millions of dollars in the omnibus. Bush has instructed Office of Management and Budget Director Jim Nussle to examine whether the administration can prevent the implementation of the spending projects.

Fratto said there might be little the Bush administration can do about earmarks.

“We may not have tools to deal with earmarks,” he said. “It may be largely an issue for, again, for Congress to deal with.”

He noted President Bush does not have a line-item veto that would allow him to comb through the budget bill eliminating earmarks.

Fratto said one thing Nussle will look at is whether money allocated for specific earmarked projects could instead by spent for other purposes. The White House thinks this may be an option because earmarks are included in report language instead of the actual legislative language of the spending bills.

“That’s something – that will be part of Director Nussle’s review,” Fratto said.

He said earmarks present a huge problem to government because they counter what he described as the merit-based approach that agencies take in determining how their appropriated funds should be spent.

“And so to then have Congress come in and identify the projects that individual members think ought to be the number one priority, after agencies and state agencies go through all this time and effort and public rule-making to try to get it right, causes real problems for how you spend money,” Fratto said.

Fratto did not mention the earmark haul made by senior Republicans. Sen. Thad Cochran (Miss.), ranking Republican on the Senate Appropriations Committee, secured $774 million worth of earmarks in total. After Cochran, Sen. Ted Stevens (Alaska), the second-ranking Republican on Appropriations, scored more money for special projects than any other member of Congress: $502 million.

Rep. Bill Young (Fla.), the ranking Republican on the Appropriations Defense Subcommittee, was the second-biggest recipient of earmarked funds in the House, with $161 million.