Report: Over 7,500 Earmarks Totaling $16 Billion Being Negotiated for Spending Bill

There are over 7,500 earmarks totaling $16 billion lawmakers are trying to negotiate to be in a year-long “omnibus” spending bill that would expire at the end of the current fiscal year — September 2023.

As key lawmakers indicated late Tuesday, there is an omnibus framework agreement. Bloomberg Government reported earlier in the day that there are over 7,500 earmarks totaling $16 billion in 2023 appropriations bills released throughout the year that could make it in the overall package.

Bloomberg Government reported that there are 3,123 earmarks totaling $7,780,973,000 from the Senate in the 2023 appropriations bills and 4,386 earmarks totaling $8,231,999,565 from the House:

The Senate included 3,123 earmarks totaling $7,780,973,000 in its fiscal 2023 appropriations bills released in July, according to a Bloomberg Government analysis of nine documents published by the Senate Appropriations Committee. A central Excel document containing all the earmarks, compiled from the nine PDF files, is available here. On the House side, lawmakers included 4,386 earmarks totaling $8,231,999,565 according to an analysis earlier this year. A central Excel doc with the House earmarks is available here. Combined, the two chambers have published 7,509 earmarks totaling $16,012,972,565.

The earmarked funding total is slightly less than 1% of the roughly $1.7 trillion government funding package lawmakers hope to finish this year. Members agreed to apply a 1% limit to the new earmarking process when they brought it back ahead of fiscal 2022, after a decade-long ban on the process.

Earmarks are spending provisions that House and Senate lawmakers have attached to bills that are likely to pass and be signed into law. The Congressional Research Service has defined earmarks as a benefit to “a specific entity or state, locality, or congressional district other than through a statutory or administrative formula or competitive award process.” – READ MORE