Quotes

The congressional habit of adding pet projects to annual spending bills has grown out of control in the past decade. Many earmarks are now simply given to the entities with the best lobbyists, and not the ones with the best cause. Claire strongly believes that federal spending should be done on a competitive basis. Soon after her swearing in, Claire became an original cosponsor of S.1, the Ethics Reform Bill, which lifted the veil of secrecy on the annual earmarking process. Taxpayers can now see these earmarks on the Internet and which congressional members asked for them. Claire believes the additional public will help reduce this bad habit that now costs billions of taxpayer dollars to feed. There is more that can be done to make government spending more transparent, fair, and honest - and Claire will fight to make the system work better for Missourians.