Jeff Flake: “people may wonder why we are doing this, combining these two bills, the Veterans bill and also Labor-HHS. It is easy to…”

“people may wonder why we are doing this, combining these two bills, the Veterans bill and also Labor-HHS. It is easy to see when you look at it. There are some 150 pages of earmarks in this conference report, including nine air-dropped earmarks. Now, these are earmarks that weren't considered by either the House or the Senate. They were simply air-dropped into the bill that we have no opportunity to amend out. We have violated our own rules. We are violating our own rules to do this: $1 million for the Thomas Daschle Center for Public Service and Representative Democracy. We are spending $1 million in this bill, air-dropped into the bill, with no opportunity to amend it out, a center for public service and representative democracy at a university somewhere named for a former Member of Congress. This simply isn't right. This isn't right. We shouldn't be doing this. This institution deserves far better than we are giving it.”