(CLO) On Presidents' Day, a leading DOGE senator is seeking to recover $400 million in a "slush fund" that was established to support presidential candidates but has not yielded significant results over the past two decades.
The bill, introduced by Senator Joni Ernst, called the Eliminating Taxpayer Residual Campaign Expenditures (ELECT) Act, aims to cut funding for this “slush fund,” which she calls “welfare for politicians .”
She stressed that instead of funding political attack ads, the money should be used to tackle the national debt, which stands at $36 trillion.
This presidential campaign fund was used by Texas Governor George W. Bush in 2000 and 2004. However, most presidential candidates have since stopped relying on that source of funding.
In the 2024 election, former Vice President Mike Pence received more than $1 million from the fund, while Green Party candidate Jill Stein used $380,000.
The late Senator John McCain also received $84.1 million from the fund in 2008. According to the Federal Election Commission (FEC), candidates nominated by major parties can receive a minimum of $20 million, plus a cost-of-living adjustment, dating back to 1974.
Senator Joni Ernst. Photo: X/SenJoniErnst
Ms. Ernst, who heads the DOGE group in the Senate, proposed canceling the fund in a letter to Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy last November.
Meanwhile, Jill Stein criticized the move, calling it an attempt to limit political competition and deny candidates from outside the two major parties the opportunity. She said the majority of American voters were calling for more options beyond the Democratic and Republican parties.
Stein argues that publicly funded campaigns help limit the influence of large corporations in American politics. She argues that ending these funds would deprive voters of choice and make American democracy more vulnerable to manipulation by billionaires.
Previously, a portion of presidential campaign funds were appropriated by Congress to fund pediatric cancer research in 2014. The bill, authored by Representative Gregg Harper and signed by President Barack Obama, directed the money to the National Institutes of Health (NIH) for pediatric cancer research.
Ngoc Anh (according to Fox News, Yahoo)
Source: https://www.congluan.vn/thuong-nghi-si-doge-muon-cham-dut-quy-den-danh-cho-cac-ung-cu-vien-tong-thong-post335003.html
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