Good afternoon - 

I take seriously the responsibility Iowans have entrusted in me to make our government more competent and less wasteful.

With a growing national debt now exceeding $19 trillion, my monthly Squeal Award identifies specific areas of government abuse, pork barrel spending and inefficiencies that have proven to be unnecessary and must be cut. 


Squeal Award: $200 Million to Duplicative, Wasteful Regional Commissions

Building on my efforts to make Washington squeal, I offered a straightforward amendment to cut $200 million in wasteful, duplicative spending tacked on to the Energy & Water Development and Related Agencies Appropriations Act.

Click here or the image below to watch my speech on the Senate floor.

My amendment would eliminate funding for four “independent” regional commissions that are duplicative of several other programs that already exist within the federal government and only direct funding to certain regions of the country. 

Even worse, these entities have wasted taxpayer money by awarding grants to questionable projects such as:

  • $250,000 to build a maple processing facility
  • $125,930 in grants for a medicinal herb grower's consortium 
  • $100,000 to the Lake Placid Ski Club to build ski jumps
  • $75,000 for a video game incubator 

While those in Washington disagree, $200 million dollars is a lot of money to us back in Iowa. At a time when every Iowan's share of the national debt exceeds $59,000, I’m sure we can all think of many fiscally sound ways to use or save that money.

Those are dollars we simply cannot afford to waste. This latest example of wasteful, duplicative spending is hereby presented this month’s Squeal Award.


Do you have an example of government waste or inefficiencies that I should take a look at? Send me an email by clicking here.

Thank you!