Former New York City mayor and GOP presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani has repeatedly touted fiscal discipline as one of his “12 Commitments to the American People.” At the top of that commitment is slashing federal earmarks, which he has stated “waste taxpayer dollars within the Federal budget.” In June, Giuliani appeared on Fox News and promised to eliminate them:
HANNITY: All right. Third, “I will restore fiscal discipline, cut wasteful spending in Washington.” Can you end earmarks? Can you end…
GIULIANI: Oh, you have to end earmarks. I mean, the idea of anonymous spending of billions and billions and hundreds of billions of dollars is totally undemocratic and creates total unaccountability. You have to end earmarks.
But Giuliani’s own law firm, Bracewell & Giuliani LLP, has contributed to this explosion of spending. Bloomberg News reports:
In all, Bracewell & Giuliani sought federal earmarks for 14 companies this year, 11 of which hired the firm after Giuliani joined in March 2005, Senate records show. Giuliani, 63, isn’t registered as a lobbyist. The firm paid him $1.2 million last year, according to his personal financial-disclosure form.
The earmarks include $1 million for Buffalo, New York-based Calspan Corp. for a program to help military pilots control their aircraft; $1.2 million for Charlotte, North Carolina-based United Protective Technologies LLC, for developing protective treatments for helicopter windshields; and $800,000 for Burlingame, California-based AtHoc Inc., for an Air Force emergency-notification system.
Giuliani has also repeatedly attacked the current Democratic-led Congress for worsening the problem. At an Aug. 7, 2007 town hall meeting at Bettendorf High School in Iowa, Giuliani claimed, “Well, the Democrats have been in power now for eight months. Not only have they not done away with earmarks, they’ve increased them.”
Earmarking by the 110th Congress has significantly declined from levels during the previous conservative-led Congresses. An analysis by Citizens Against Government Waste estimates that earmarks in FY08 appropriations bills are “down about 33 percent from the $29 billion in earmarks in FY06 spending bills.”
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