Washington, D.C. – Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW) today released its preliminary analysis of the Fiscal Year 2009 Department of Defense Appropriations Act.  There were 1,968 earmarks in this year’s defense bill, compared to the 2,108 projects in fiscal year 2008.  The total cost of these projects fell 35.6 percent to $4.7 billion from the $7.3 billion included in last year’s bill.  Despite this reduction, members of Congress from both sides of the aisle loaded the bill with earmarks, including seven legislators appropriating more than $100 million—all in the name of National Defense. 

The five most prolific porkers were:

• $204,400,000 by indicted Senate Defense Appropriations Subcommittee Ranking Member Ted Stevens (R-Alaska), including:  four projects totaling $34.6 million for the Joint National Training Capability-Red Flag/Northern Edge Training Range, $16 million for a C-17 assault landing zone, and $2 million for hibernation genomics.
• $198,440,000 by Senate Appropriations Committee Ranking Member Thad Cochran (R-Miss.), including:  $32.6 million for a light utility helicopter, $8 million for the Extremely Large, Domestic Expendable and Reusable Structures Manufacturing Center, and $4.4 million for the Army Center of Excellence in Acoustics.
• $182,200,000 by Senate Defense Appropriations Subcommittee Chairman Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii), including:  $23 million for the Hawaii Federal Healthcare Network, $10 million for the Hawaii Technology Development Venture, and $3.6 million for Intelligent Decision Exploration.
• $140,200,000 by Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Robert Byrd (D-W.Va.), including:  $38 million for the ABL Restoration Plan, $20 million for records digitization and repository modernization at the AFIP/Joint Pathology Center, and $7 million for the Institute of Advanced Flexible Manufacturing Systems.
• $110,800,000 by House Defense Appropriations Subcommittee Ranking Member Bill Young (R-Fla.), including:  $4.5 million for Comprehensive Maritime Domain Awareness, $2.4 million for the Air Warrior-Joint Service Vacuum Packed Life Raft, and three projects for $1.9 million for a WMD Civil Support Team in Florida.

Citizens Against Government Waste is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization dedicated to eliminating waste, fraud, mismanagement and abuse in government.