SALON

Monday, Oct 1, 2012 8:30 AM UTC

Akin parses stand on pet projects in Senate bid

By

Topics: From the Wires,

Akin parses stand on pet projects in Senate bidIn this Sept. 25, 2012, photo, Missouri Republican Senate candidate, Rep. Todd Akin, R-Mo., speaks during a news conference at the start of a statewide bus tour in St. Louis. Akin has backed millions of dollars of earmarks in recent years. He even proudly defended an earmark for military armor during a TV ad in his Republican Senate primary. Now Akin has aligned himself with a group that wants to ban earmarks. And the membership of the Senate Conservatives Fund has pledged $290,000 to help finance his campaign against Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill. Akin denies he has flip-flopped and rejects any assertion of a quid pro quo for campaign cash. (AP Photo/Jeff Roberson) (Credit: AP)

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — Missouri Rep. Todd Akin has backed almost $100 million for pet projects in recent years, including money for home-state military programs and local highway work. During his Republican Senate primary this summer, Akin even aired a television ad proudly defending his effort to bring home federal dollars for production of military armor in his district.

Now Akin has aligned himself with a group that wants to ban these so-called earmarks, and the membership of the Senate Conservatives Fund has pledged $290,000 to help replenish the Republican’s cash-strapped campaign against Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill.

Akin denies that it’s a policy reversal and rejects any assertion of a quid pro quo for campaign cash. Five weeks to Election Day, the Republican is struggling to put back the pieces of his bid after his widely criticized statement that women have a biological defense against pregnancy in cases of “legitimate rape.” McCaskill, who has been hammering Akin in television ads over that remark, now has a new line of criticism on federal spending.

McCaskill asserts that Akin’s apparent evolution on earmarks undercuts the very essence of his campaign image as a “principled conservative” who stands firm for his beliefs.

“He defended (earmarks) as a constitutional principle, and then as soon as someone said there will be money for your campaign if you say you are no longer for earmarks, he said, ‘OK,’” McCaskill, a vocal opponent of earmarks, told The Associated Press. Akin “tried to have it both ways, which is about as unprincipled as you can get.”

Akin has remained competitive with McCaskill thanks largely to small-dollar donors and conservative Republicans who accepted his apology for the “legitimate rape” comment. They rallied to his cause when party leaders pulled their financial backing and tried to force him to quit the race. But Akin needs a steady stream of cash to continuing airing his campaign message through Election Day, and the backing of the Senate Conservatives Fund marked his most significant financial commitment since his rape remark.

Akin insists there was no twisting or contorting to land the important endorsement of the formidable political action committee founded by conservative Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C.

“I can tell you what I’m for or what I’m against, and as it turned out, that’s pretty consistent — or almost exactly consistent — with where a lot of the Senate conservatives are,” Akin said.

Senate rules define an earmark — or a “congressionally directed spending item,” as it’s officially termed — as a provision included in a bill at the request of a lawmaker that directs money to a specific entity, state or congressional district without going through a formula-driven or competitive award process. Earmarks now are banned in the Republican-controlled House, Senate Republicans have voted not to use them and a number of Democrats oppose them, most notably McCaskill.

But from the 2008 to 2010 fiscal years, Akin was involved in securing $99 million of earmarks, according to Taxpayers for Common Sense, a nonpartisan watchdog group in Washington which tracks earmarks. In 2010, the last year in which the House used earmarks in appropriations bills, Akin teamed up with then-Sen. Kit Bond on a variety of spending requests.

Akin said he draws a distinction between spending allotments for such things as road projects that originate in a committee and work their way through the legislative process and special items that get added at the last moment in a joint House and Senate conference committee — leaving no time for most members to review them or attempt to strip them from the bill.

“Everybody’s got different definitions” for earmarks, Akin added. “But my commonsense is you don’t want people doing quid for quo kinds of things, and I don’t do that.”

When defining an earmark, Taxpayers for Common Sense draws no distinctions regarding the purpose of a project or the point at which it was added in the legislative process.

Akin said he supports some limitations on the ability of lawmakers to direct money to pet projects — but only to a certain point.

“Don’t take the definition so broadly that the members of Congress don’t have any input into the budget process,” he said.

McCaskill calls such assertions “complete balderdash,” arguing that Congress can still exercise financial oversight without earmarks. McCaskill has teamed up with DeMint to push for a ban on earmarks.

More David A. Lieb.

Next Article

Related Stories

More Related Stories

Featured Slide Shows

The week in 10 pics

close X
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11
  • Lisa Montgomery embraces her nephew Thursday after a tornado tore apart her home in Cleburne, Texas. The twister killed six people and destroyed entire swaths of the North Texas town.
    Credit: AP/LM Otero

  • Jack McMahon, the defense attorney for abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell, speaks outside the Criminal Justice Center in Philadelphia Tuesday. His client was convicted of killing three babies in his clinic, and will serve multiple life sentences.
    Credit: AP/Matt Rourke

  • A photo taken Monday captures Vice President Joe Biden's response to a Milwaukee second-grader's innovative proposal to end America's epidemic of gun violence. This guy!
    Credit: AP/Jenny Aicher

  • Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., flanked by a grouper-eyed Michele Bachmann, addresses the IRS' admission that it targeted Tea Party groups in advance of the 2012 election. In an op-ed for CNN Thursday, the Kentucky senator slammed the president for his faux outrage.
    Credit: AP/Molly Riley

  • Ousted IRS chief Steven Miller is sworn in on Capitol Hill Friday. Miller testified before the House Ways and Means Committee on the extra scrutiny the agency gave conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status.
    Credit: AP/J. Scott Applewhite

  • Attorney General Eric Holder pauses as he testifies on Capitol Hill before the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday. Holder is under fire, among other things, for the Justice Department's gathering of phone records at the Associated Press.
    Credit: AP/Carolyn Kaster

  • O.J. Simpson sits during an evidentiary hearing at Clark County District Court in Las Vegas, Nev., Thursday. Simpson, who is currently serving a nine-to-33-year sentence in state prison for armed robbery and kidnapping, is using a writ of habeas corpus to seek a new trial.
    Credit: AP/Las Vegas Review-Journal/Jeff Scheid

  • Major Tom to ground control: On Sunday astronaut Chris Hadfield recorded the first music video from space, a cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity."
    Credit: AP/NASA/Chris Hadfield

  • When it rains it pours. President Barack Obama speaks during a news conference Thursday with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, inexplicably inspiring an #umbrellagate Twitter meme.
    Credit: AP/Jacquelyn Martin

  • A smoke plume rises high above a road block at the intersection of County A and Ross Road east of Solon Springs, Wis., Tuesday. No injuries were reported, but the the wildfire caused evacuations across northwestern Wisconsin.
    Credit: AP/The Duluth News-Tribune/Clint Austin

  • Recent Slide Shows

  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11

Related Videos

Comments

 0 Comments

Comment Preview

Your name will appear as username

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href=""> <b> <em> <strong> <i> <blockquote>

follow salon

Most Read

Popular on Reddit

links from salon.com

vote
FBI reportedly joins Bachmann campaign finance probe
220 points221 points | 13 comments
vote
Jon Karl makes things worse: He regrets “inaccurate” Benghazi email but says his story based on it “still entirely stands.” Really. ABC News?
195 points196 points | 29 comments
vote
Paul Krugman’s right: Austerity kills. "In an economy where we’re all in the same boat, one person’s spending is another person’s income. So when the government cuts spending, it reduces people’s income, leading to less business, more unemployment, and a vicious spiral of slowing down the economy."
188 points189 points | 114 comments
vote
“Jodorowsky’s Dune”: The sci-fi classic that never was.
77 points78 points | 16 comments
vote
Doug Henwood: Capitalism Thrives on Class Exploitation
42 points43 points | 5 comments

From Around the Web

Presented by Scribol
listener_new_rect The Listener: So long, Sookie Stackhouse

Recommendations