Support Amendments to Reign in Agriculture Appropriations’ Earmarks

May 23, 2006

Dear Representative:

Taxpayers for Common Sense Action urges you to support amendments from Representative Jeff Flake (R-AZ) and others to strike earmarked spending from H.R. 5384, the Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2007. This bill is weighed down by well over four hundred and fifty separate earmarks funding a string of special-interest giveaways.

The level of earmarking underscores the misguided priorities of our agriculture policies.  Farm subsidies waste taxpayer dollars, invite retaliatory tariffs on American exports, encourage the production of huge crop surpluses that lower world crop prices, and threaten to impede successful global trade negotiations. Earmarked programs that dictate agency decision making and underwrite agribusiness’s cost of doing business are only further examples of how much America’s agriculture sector has come to rely on government hand-outs for its profit margin instead of the market place.

The top priority for Congress should be eliminating wasteful programs and reducing unnecessary spending, not micromanaging agency decision making to support corporate welfare with earmarks.

Again, Taxpayers for Common Sense Action is opposed to the explosion of earmarks and subsidies in the FY07 Agriculture Appropriations bill. We urge you to support amendments to reduce the cost and strip earmarked projects out of the bill. If you would like to receive more information or discuss this further, please contact Franz Matzner at 202-546-8500 ext. 127, or Franz@taxpayer.net.

Sincerely,

Steve Ellis

Vice-president of Programs

Taxpayers for Common Sense Action