Earmarks & Community Project Funding

Earmarks are congressionally directed spending — provisions in appropriations bills that direct federal funds to specific projects, recipients, or localities rather than leaving allocation to agency discretion. They are how a member of Congress delivers tangible results to their district: a new bridge, a hospital expansion, a university research center. Earmarks were banned in 2011 after public backlash over high-profile abuses like the "Bridge to Nowhere." They returned in 2021 under a new name — Community Project Funding (CPF) — with new transparency requirements, a 1% cap on total appropriations, and restrictions on for-profit recipients. Understanding earmarks means understanding the most concrete form of congressional influence over federal spending and the tension between democratic accountability (members directing resources to their constituents) and technocratic governance (agencies allocating funds on merit).

Legal Authority

• 2 U.S.C. § 658 et seq. — Unfunded Mandates Reform Act: provides transparency requirements for congressional spending directives; not the primary earmark authority but relevant to disclosure requirements
• 2 U.S.C. § 1501 et seq. — Congressional procedures for appropriations: the framework within which earmarks are inserted into appropriations bills; appropriations committees have jurisdiction over all spending in their bills, including member-directed spending
• House and Senate rules — Earmarks (now "Community Project Funding") are governed primarily by congressional chamber rules, not statute: the House Appropriations Committee's CPF application process, the 1% cap on total discretionary spending, the prohibition on for-profit entities, and the disclosure requirements are all established through committee rules that can change each Congress

Key Mechanics

Community Project Funding (the current earmark mechanism) operates through the annual appropriations cycle. Each member of the House and Senate may submit a limited number of CPF requests to the Appropriations subcommittees with jurisdiction over their target programs. The Appropriations Committee reviews requests for eligibility (public entity or nonprofit, no conflicts of interest, project serves a defined community need) and selects a subset for inclusion in the appropriations bills. Selected projects are publicly disclosed — unlike old earmarks, the member's name, the recipient, the amount, and the purpose must all appear in the public record. The final CPF list appears in conference reports and joint explanatory statements; individual projects are legally binding once the appropriations bill is enacted.

How It Works

What Earmarks Are and Are Not

An earmark directs federal funds to a specific recipient or project by name in legislative text or an accompanying explanatory statement. Traditional earmarks appeared in appropriations bills as line items: "For the XYZ Bridge in [City, State], $10,000,000." Agency discretion is removed — the money goes where Congress directed.

Earmarks differ from:

• Formula grants: funds distributed to states or localities by statutory formula (population, poverty rate, etc.) — agency doesn't choose recipients
• Competitive grants: funds agencies award through a merit-based selection process
• Block grants: lump-sum funds given to states with minimal federal conditions on use

The policy argument for earmarks is democratic accountability: elected members, not unelected bureaucrats, should decide where federal money goes. The argument against is corruption risk and merit displacement — money flows to well-connected districts or donors rather than the highest-priority projects.

The Ban (2011) and Reinstatement (2021)

Earmarks peaked in the mid-2000s at roughly $29 billion per year and tens of thousands of individual projects. The "Bridge to Nowhere" — a roughly $223 million Alaska earmark to build a bridge connecting Ketchikan to Gravina Island, which had only 50 residents on the island side (the bridge would also serve the Ketchikan airport) — became the symbol of waste; estimated total project cost climbed above $300 million as design progressed. The Republican majority banned earmarks in 2011; Democrats followed suit. For a decade, the formal earmark process did not exist.

Why they returned: The earmark ban had unintended consequences. Without earmarks, members lost a tangible tool for building legislative coalitions — earmarks had historically been used to buy votes for contentious legislation. The ban also shifted power from Congress to the executive branch: agencies, not members, now decided which projects in which districts received discretionary grants. Some members argued that this empowered bureaucrats rather than democratically elected representatives.

In 2021, House Democrats reinstated Community Project Funding with significantly tightened rules: a 1% cap on total appropriations, a limit of 10 requests per member, a ban on for-profit recipients, required public disclosure of all requests, member certification of no personal financial interest, and publication of all funded projects. Senate Republicans initially resisted but Senate Democrats adopted "Congressionally Directed Spending" in a parallel process.

Process: How CPF Works

1. Request period: Each appropriations cycle, members submit CPF requests to the relevant Appropriations subcommittee. The House requires public posting of all requests on the member's official website.

2. Subcommittee review: Appropriations subcommittee staff review requests for eligibility (no for-profit recipients, project must be within the subcommittee's jurisdiction) and merit. Not all requests are funded — subcommittees select a subset for inclusion.

3. Inclusion in bill: Approved CPF items appear in the appropriations bill or its accompanying explanatory statement. The explanatory statement is not statutory text but is treated by agencies as binding direction.

4. Agency implementation: The relevant agency receives the appropriated funds and is directed to award them to the specified recipient. For infrastructure projects, this often means a grant to a state or local government; for research, a direct grant to a university or research institution.

5. Disclosure and oversight: All funded CPF items must be publicly disclosed. Members who received funded earmarks are listed; journalists, watchdog groups, and opponents can review what was funded and for whom.

Notable Abuses and Reforms

The history of earmarks includes genuine corruption: Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham (R-CA) went to prison for accepting bribes in exchange for earmarks; Rep. William Jefferson (D-LA) was convicted for taking bribes tied to legislative favors; the Abramoff lobbying scandal involved earmarks obtained for clients. These cases drove the 2011 ban.

The new CPF rules address the direct corruption vectors: the for-profit ban eliminates the most egregious cases where earmarks went to companies that hired the member's former staff or donated to their campaigns. The personal financial interest certification bars members from earmarking money to entities in which they have a stake. However, critics note that earmarks can still go to nonprofit entities associated with major donors, and the indirect political benefits of directing federal money to a member's district remain.

How It Affects You

If you are a citizen or voter: Community Project Funding is how you track what your member of Congress is delivering to your district. Every funded CPF item must be publicly disclosed; you can compare what your member requested, what was approved, and what neighboring districts received. Earmarks are also a rare form of transparency about member priorities — a member who consistently earmarks for one sector or one type of nonprofit may be revealing constituent service priorities or donor relationships. Conversely, a member who receives few or no CPF approvals may lack seniority or relationships on the relevant Appropriations subcommittee.

If you are an advocate, lobbyist, or interest group representing nonprofits, universities, hospitals, or local governments: Community Project Funding is a direct path to federal funding for specific projects that would not compete well in agency grant programs. The process: identify your priority project, find a sympathetic House or Senate member to submit the request, work with the member's staff to develop the request documentation, and advocate for its inclusion in the subcommittee's bill. The timeline is annual — requests are submitted in the spring for the fiscal year beginning October 1. The for-profit ban means private companies cannot directly receive CPF, but they can benefit indirectly through partnerships with eligible nonprofit or governmental recipients.

If you work at a federal agency: CPF items in appropriations bills are not optional — they are congressional directions to spend money in specific ways. When CPF funding appears in your appropriations, your agency must award those funds to the specified recipients, subject only to the legal requirements governing your grant programs (Davis-Bacon, NEPA, Buy American, etc.). CPF does not exempt projects from standard compliance requirements, which sometimes creates friction between the congressional timeline and the agency's grant administration process. Agencies that delay or redirect CPF funds risk congressional scrutiny and appropriations riders in subsequent years.

If you are a journalist, researcher, or policy analyst: All funded CPF items are disclosed in the explanatory statements accompanying appropriations bills and in member-by-member disclosure databases maintained by watchdog organizations (Taxpayers for Common Sense publishes a comprehensive CPF database). Comparing CPF requests to member campaign finance records, family financial disclosures (OGE Form 278), and post-government employment reveals potential conflicts. The Congressional Research Service publishes annual analyses of earmark trends and the CPF process.

Recent Developments

• 2022 — The first CPF cycle under the new rules resulted in approximately $9.7 billion in funded projects across FY2022 appropriations; the House Appropriations Committee published a full database of all requests and funded items
• 2023 — Senate Republicans, who had initially resisted reinstating earmarks, largely embraced Congressionally Directed Spending once the rules were in place and they had the opportunity to direct funds to their own states
• 2024 — House Republicans sought to cut the CPF cap as part of broader spending reduction negotiations; the 1% cap was preserved in the FY2024 omnibus but scrutiny of individual earmarks increased
• 2025 — DOGE (Department of Government Efficiency) scrutinized CPF-funded grants as part of its review of federal spending; several CPF grants to nonprofits were flagged for review, creating uncertainty about whether directed appropriations could be impounded — a question with significant Impoundment Control Act implications