House Republicans Monday were gearing up to potentially slash so-called “woke” earmarks from the largest domestic spending bill for 2024, along with funding for other local projects.
In January the conservative Heritage Fund put forth a list of what it said were “woke earmarks” in the $1.7 trillion omnibus spending bill that was passed along bipartisan lines in December.
The earmarks on the list included what the Heritage Fund called “LGBTQIA+ Pride Centers,” funding for the Equity Institute in Rhode Island to “indoctrinate teachers with ‘antiracism virtual labs,’” a “Michelle Obama Trail” in Oregon, and “MLK Labor”—an affiliate of the AFL-CIO labor organization.
House Republican lawmakers have reportedly targeted all earmarks in the 2024 Labor-HHS-Education bill, as well as the smaller Financial Services measure.
Republicans are also reported to be on the hunt for potential domestic spending cuts in order to meet a pledge to cut more than $130 billion from current levels.
House Republican appropriators were further weighing removing Defense earmarks to cut waste at the Pentagon. However, the Senate Appropriations Committee had already cut Defense earmarks in the upper chamber’s version of the December omnibus, and a Roll Call-Congressional Quarterly tally found that earmarks totaled just $16 million for Defense in 2023.
Sources tell the Congressional news outlet Roll Call that Republicans plan to roll out their earmarks guidance as early as this week.
