Clinton: $2.3B in earmarks
Hillary Clinton, earmarker extraordinary: ‘Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) has requested nearly $2.3 billion in federal earmarks for 2009, almost three times the largest amount received by a single senator this year.’
Clinton is continuing to request billions for earmarks, most of which will go to her home state.
The money is needed for homeland security, emergency response and health projects throughout New York, according to documents provided by her office.
The total amount Clinton requested greatly surpasses the $837 million secured last year by Sen. Thad Cochran of Mississippi, the ranking Republican on the Appropriations Committee who took home the largest dollar amount of earmarks in the current fiscal year’s spending bills. In those bills, Clinton secured $342 million in earmarks.
Why, o why, would she request so many earmarks? Easy:
Clinton’s huge earmark requests have some speculating that the former first lady is preparing for a soft landing should she lose the Democratic primary to Obama and refocus her energy on winning a third Senate term…
“There’s a decent chance that she is going to remain the senator from New York, and she needs to do what she can to stay the senator from New York.”
Luckily for her, she isn’t a member of the ‘no excessive spending’ party.
