Legislators send millions to groups connected to their relatives

HorryForThree · Feb 7, 2012

Not entirely surprising, but disappointing nonetheless. Sadly, I'm sure most of them will get re-elected.

From today's Washington Post:

The Post compared the annual financial disclosure reports filed by every member of Congress over the past decade to a wide range of public records. The resulting snapshot was then matched to earmarks and other spending provisions members sought for pet projects. The process uncovered nearly 50 members who helped direct millions of dollars in earmarks to projects that either held the potential to enhance the surroundings of a lawmaker's own property, or aided entities connected to their immediate family. Lawmakers said their earmarks and spending provisions were done to benefit the public, not their private interests.
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A U.S. senator from South Dakota helped add millions to a Pentagon program his wife supervised as a contract employee. A Washington congressman boosted the budget of an environmental group that his son ran as executive director. A Texas congresswoman guided millions to a university where her husband served as a vice president.
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Lawmakers said in interviews the actions they took were not intended to directly benefit their relatives or themselves. Instead, they say, the largesse was meant to assist corporations, educational programs and community organizations that employ, educate and help residents in their congressional districts.
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Members of Congress have more leeway than executive branch officials or individuals in publicly held companies, who operate under stricter conflict-of-interest rules that generally prevent them from taking actions that might benefit businesses or institutions where their relatives work. The legislators set and enforce their own rules, giving themselves broad latitude to take steps that can end up directly benefitting their immediate family.

“The executive branch has far stricter ethics standards than Congress does — and Congress has set these standards,” said Craig Holman of Public Citizen, a nonprofit government watchdog group. “The executive branch can’t steer contracts or work to businesses where family members work. They can’t even own stock in industries that they oversee, unlike Congress. It’s complete hypocrisy.”

Members engaged in behavior that included directly funding programs run by their children, earmarking money to entities represented by their lobbyist relatives and sending tax dollars to colleges where their family members work or serve on boards of trustees.
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You can find a list of the congressmen, the amount they secured for their own connections, and their official responses when questioned about it here.

CCorn · Feb 7, 2012

Disgusting, but that's politics. I remember reading about all the congress men, in both parties, who are guinea pigs for Warren Buffet and made quite a few side $$ from TARP.

SirCharlesFan · Feb 7, 2012

I looked through several of them on the map and they looked like a bit of a stretch to say the Congressmen financially benefitted more than the rest of the general public.

thadeus · Feb 7, 2012

The differences between Republicans and Democrats are nowhere near the same degree as the differences between regular citizens and Washington politicians.

Mathloom · Feb 8, 2012

thadeus said: ↑

The differences between Republicans and Democrats are nowhere near the same degree as the differences between regular citizens and Washington politicians.
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double post

Mathloom · Feb 8, 2012

thadeus said: ↑

The differences between Republicans and Democrats are nowhere near the same degree as the differences between regular citizens and Washington politicians.
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*Ding ding ding*

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Legislators send millions to groups connected to their relatives

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