{"id":28708,"date":"2011-04-25T10:31:41","date_gmt":"2011-04-25T16:31:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/?p=28708"},"modified":"2011-04-25T17:09:32","modified_gmt":"2011-04-25T23:09:32","slug":"house-rejects-pearce-measure-some-call-an-earmark","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2011\/04\/house-rejects-pearce-measure-some-call-an-earmark\/","title":{"rendered":"House rejects Pearce measure some call an earmark"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

U.S. Rep. Steve Pearce (Photo by Heath Haussamen)<\/p><\/div>\n

Did Southern New Mexico\u2019s congressman, who has complained about earmark abuse in the past, try to get his colleagues to approve an earmark that would benefit a campaign contributor?<\/p>\n

According to a Politico article<\/a>, members of both parties thought that was exactly what was happening and recently voted to kill Republican Rep. Steve Pearce\u2019s<\/a> proposal.<\/p>\n

From Politico:<\/p>\n

\u201cNew Mexico Republican Rep. Steve Pearce tried and failed to win adoption of an amendment earlier this month that critics in both parties say looked, smelled, walked, sounded like and ultimately amounted to an earmark \u2014 despite a GOP ban on the practice and a House rule requiring amendments containing earmarks to identify them.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe amendment in question would have allowed Do\u00f1a Ana County, N.M., to convey land to Verde Realty, which is building a massive planned community next to the airport, as part of an exchange of parcels. Under federal law, the county can\u2019t relinquish land given to it by the federal government without a new act of Congress. Several of Houston-based Verde\u2019s executives contributed to Pearce\u2019s campaign in 2007.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe amendment failed, 207-215, after a behind-the-scenes fight over whether it violated the letter or spirit of House rules and a separate Republican Conference moratorium on earmark requests. That controversial moratorium was adopted in late 2010. Under House rules, a point of order may be made against an amendment carrying an earmark if its sponsor does not identify it as such.
\n\u201cPearce\u2019s camp says the amendment simply did not fit the definition of an earmark, but 38 Republicans, including House Majority Leader Eric Cantor and Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy, nonetheless joined with Democrats to defeat the measure.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

<\/p>\n

You can read more about the situation from Politico here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Pearce has never been anti-earmark, but he has accused members of both parties of abusing the earmark process<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s what the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee<\/a> had to say about the situation:<\/p>\n

\u201cEven his fellow Republicans wouldn\u2019t go along with Rep. Steve Pearce\u2019s scheme to violate the ban on earmarks for the best interests of his contributors,\u201d the DCCC\u2019s Gabriela Domenzain said. \u201cThis report reveals that Rep. Steve Pearce\u2019s real agenda is to get his pork, especially for his special-interest friends.\u201d<\/p>\n

Update, 5:05 p.m.<\/h3>\n

From Pearce spokesman Eric Layer, who said he wanted to point out \u201ca few facts that the Politico story didn\u2019t get correct.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201c1. This isn\u2019t an earmark. It doesn\u2019t meet the definition of an earmark. The fight and the quotes have a lot more to do with the games on Capitol Hill than anything else.<\/p>\n

\u201c2. As further proof this wasn\u2019t an earmark, the transfer did pass in the same bill. Congressman Pearce, working with Democratic Congressman Jim Matheson, successfully passed an amendment that permitted the transfer.<\/p>\n

\u201c3. As a final note, Congressman Pearce worked with Democratic Senator Bingaman, along with Democratic Congressmen Heinrich and Luj\u00e1n, to aid Do\u00f1a Ana County who requested this action to help their citizens.<\/p>\n

\u201cHere is the text of the Amendment that passed:<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Pearce-Matheson Amendment \u2018Allows the Secretary of Transportation to release any airport, city, or county from the terms, conditions, reservations, or restrictions on deeds which the U.S. conveyed to an airport, city, county property for airport purposes, provided that the release results in furthering airport purposes.\u2019\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

UPDATED: Did U.S. Rep. Steve Pearce try to get his colleagues to approve an earmark that would benefit a campaign contributor? According to a Politico article, members of both parties thought that was exactly what was happening and recently voted to kill Pearce\u2019s proposal.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[116],"class_list":["post-28708","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news-and-analysis","tag-washington"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28708","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28708"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28708\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28708"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28708"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28708"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}