As if his high-profile battle to deprive other members of Congress of so-called earmarks were not making Arizona Republican Jeff Flake unpopular enough among his colleagues, Flake has set his sights on a controversial practice known as franked mail.
Franking is the process by which a member of Congress substitutes his or her signature for a postage stamp. A new bill authored by Flake would require each piece of franked mail to bear a notice of how much the piece cost taxpayers, which Flake believes will shame his fellow members into reducing their spending.
“When you pick up a piece of franked mail, you can’t tell the difference between that and somebody’s campaign mail,” Flake said in an interview. “I think that gives incumbents an advantage they simply shouldn’t have.”
Not all Congressional mail, Flake argues, is a waste of taxpayer dollars. His office spent about $1,400 on mass mailings in 2005, according to a study by the National Taxpayers’ Union. But, says Flake, his mailings were to high school seniors, informing them of their ability to apply for an appointment to military service academies.
Flake’s problem is with glossy mailers that, as the practice of the continuous campaign progresses, are beginning to look more like campaign fliers than like official government mail. A study by the Washington newspaper Roll Call revealed that freshmen members of Congress spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on these glossy pieces during their first three months in office. New York Congressman Michael Arcuri, a freshman Democrat, spent $78,350 alone, while Oklahoma Republican Mary Fallin spent nearly $65,000 on mailings.
The effort to publicize the cost of the mailings is not likely to move quickly through the House. After it was introduced, the bill was referred to the House Administration Committee. Spokespeople for the committee and for Chairman Bob Brady, a Pennsylvania Democrat, declined to comment on when — or whether — the bill would be brought up.
Challenges to earmarks continue
Flake’s move on franking comes as he continues his arduous and sometimes lonely crusade against special appropriations of funds for members of Congress, better known as earmarks. As Congress raced to leave Washington before the August recess, Flake took the floor late on a Saturday night to offer amendments to strip earmarks from a massive appropriations bill, the last item on the House’s agenda.
As weary members of Congress waited to vote on the $460 billion Defense Department Appropriations bill, which funds the department through fiscal year 2008, Flake urged his colleagues to remove six special funding projects from the bill, totaling $58 million in discretionary spending. His amendments were the last of 47 he has offered this year to rid budget bills of what he views as unnecessary spending. He has succeeded in passing just one.
Flake, it seems, does not mind whose earmarks he targets. Among those he went after was Pennsylvania Democrat John Murtha, chairman of the subcommittee of the powerful Appropriations Committee that doles out military and defense spending dollars. Flake challenged a $39 million earmark for the National Drug Intelligence Center, in Murtha’s district. The measure failed, 109-301. In the 109th Congress, Flake challenged earmarks offered by House Speaker Dennis Hastert and Jerry Lewis, a California Republican who chaired the House Appropriations Committee.
Targets Arizona spending
And Flake will even target spending in his home state. A $1 million earmark, proposed by Congressman Ed Pastor in the Energy and Water Appropriations bill, in July, would go to fund a program at the Maricopa Community Colleges in Phoenix. Flake’s attempt to strip that measure from the bill failed by voice vote.
Democrats have changed rules on earmarks, requiring members to associate their names with projects for which they seek funding. “We’re making a mistake as Republicans in not taking a more proactive stance against earmarks,” Flake said. Instead of drawing a clear contrast with Democrats, said Flake, “it seems all we’ve done is try to find out what the new rules do so we can participate fully.”
Flake’s one success during his fight against earmarks, much to his chagrin, came at the expense of fellow Republican Patrick McHenry of North Carolina. McHenry, the youngest member of the House, has made a name for himself by lobbing rhetorical bombs at Democrats. The new majority was happy to vote with Flake to strip $129,000 from the Financial Services Appropriations bill in June. The money would have gone to fund the Mitchell County, North Carolina, Development Foundation, in McHenry’s district.
The House has finished its work on appropriations bills for the year, but Flake spokesman Matthew Specht said the battle over earmarks may not be over. Thanks to a mechanism in a recently passed lobbying and ethics reform bill, Flake may be able to attempt to remove more earmarks that are inserted into appropriations bills after a conference committee, made up of representatives from the House and Senate, reconcile the two bills. Flake, said Specht, may challenge any additional earmarks that come out of conference.