Ron Paul-Inspired Group Lobbies for Bill Prompted by Paul Reimbursements

Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call File Photo

A nonprofit group founded to push Rep. Ron Pauls agenda on Capitol Hill has put its weight behind a bill inspired by a reimbursement snafu of Pauls.

The Liberty Committee, headed by former Paul aide David James, has launched a lobbying campaign for legislation to improve disclosure of Congressional office expenditures.

The bill, H.Res. 580, would help expose Washington corruption, the group says, citing Roll Calls reporting on Paul double-billing plane tickets and other travel expenses both to taxpayers and his campaign.

The practice netted Paul thousands of dollars in dozens of examples for which documents show he was paid twice.

Roll Calls review also showed that changes to expenditure reporting in 2009 have shielded details about how lawmakers spend their taxpayer-funded office budgets, prompting Rep. Mike Quigley (D-Ill.) to introduce legislation on the subject.

Quigleys proposal would require Members to itemize individual travel expenses, among other things, in order to fill in gaps in publicly reported data that arose in 2009.

That year, the House for the first time released its quarterly expense reports online. But Congressional administrators erased a vast array of details on the expenditures, making it impossible to determine what much of the money was actually spent on.

Liberty Committee, which Paul tasked James to launch in 1998, is lobbying for Quigleys bill.

Congress suffers from a deficit of public trust, but we can earn that trust back by increasing transparency so taxpayers know how we spend their hard earned dollars. Shining more sunlight on the travel reimbursement process is an important part of holding elected officials accountable because it is a frequent expenditure in most congressional offices. I welcome any support for this and similar transparency efforts, Quigley said in a recent statement.

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Ron Paul-Inspired Group Lobbies for Bill Prompted by Paul Reimbursements