Schumer’s $2 Million for Bronx Hip Hop Museum Spotlighted Amid Near-Record Setting Congressional Earmarking Spree

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) gives a thumbs up after speaking on the phone with his daughter Alison, and Alison’s wife from his office after the Senate voted on the "Respect for Marriage" Act at the Capitol Building in Washington, on Nov. 29, 2022. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

Members of Congress from both parties appear headed to approving a record number of earmarks—tax-funded spending projects in their districts or states that are typically buried in massive omnibus spending bills—including a $2 million award by Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) to build the Universal Hip Hop Museum in the Bronx, New York.

The museum, which is under construction, “celebrates and preserves the history of local and global Hip Hop music and culture to inspire, empower, and promote understanding ... [and] provide a space for audiences, artists, and technology to converge, creating unparalleled educational and entertainment experiences around the Hip Hop culture of the past, present, and future.”

The museum showed revenues of only $3.65 million in 2021 on its most recently available federal tax return, but multiple corporate partners are listed on its website, including Microsoft and YouTube. Spokesmen for Schumer and Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), who also supported the federal funding for the museum, did not respond to The Epoch Times’ request for comment.

The Hip Hop museum earmark is just one of more than 7,000 earmarks requested by individual senators and representatives in both political parties and highlighted in the recently released “2023 Congressional Pig Book,” compiled by Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW), a Washington-based nonprofit that researches and exposes wasteful government spending.

The 2023 earmarks were approved by the 117th Congress in December 2022 as part of the $1.7 trillion Omnibus Appropriations bill. Democrats controlled both chambers of Congress, as well as the White House,  in 2022.

Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) speaks to guests during a campaign stop in Dubuque, Iowa, on on March 19, 2019. (Scott Olson/Getty Images)

“This year’s release exposes 7,396 earmarks, an increase of 43.9 percent from the 5,138 in Fiscal Year (FY) 2022, at a cost of $26.1 billion, an increase of 38.1 percent from the $18.9 billion in earmarks in FY 2022,” according to the Pig Book.

“The $26.1 billion earmarked in FY 2023 is the third highest total since CAGW began tracking earmarks in 1991, behind the $29 billion in FY 2006 and $27.3 billion in FY 2005. Legislators are now well on their way to breaking the all-time record,” the Pig Book reports.

Earmarks became controversial in the first decade of the 21st century, thanks to public exposure of projects like “The Bridge to Nowhere” that proposed to provide $223 million in 2004 to build a bridge connecting the Alaskan mainland to the sparsely populated Gravina Island.

Two members of Congress—former Rep. Chaka Fattah (D-Pa.) in 2017 and former Rep. Randy Cunningham (R-Calif.) in 2006—served prison terms in recent years following their convictions in scandals linked to earmarks.

But public opposition, led by Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.)—known among congressional colleagues as “Dr. No” for his opposition to earmarks—prompted a congressional ban. The House of Representatives acted first, in 2011, following election of the “Tea Party Congress” in 2010. Then-President Barack Obama pledged in his 2011 State of the Union address to veto any bill containing earmarks, which pre-empted senatorial earmarking.

Congress brought earmarks back in 2021, however, with bipartisan support, though with reforms designed to ensure greater transparency and accountability and rebranded as “Community Project Funding.”

Even with the reforms, however, longtime earmark critics like CAGW President Tom Schatz says the fundamental problem with the practice remains, using federal tax dollars to support special interests projects, especially those backed by members of the Senate and House appropriations committees and members of the party leadership in both chambers of Congress.

Appropriators’ Candy Store

“The Hip Hop Museum earmark could be avoided by getting just 51 cents from each of New York City’s 8.8 million residents or from private contributors,” Schatz told The Epoch Times.

Data compiled by CAGW for the 2023 edition of the Pig Book shows that 41.4 percent of all the earmarks, constituting 30 percent of the total money value, were requested by just 89 members of the two appropriations panels.

“As the late Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) explained regarding those making the case for earmarks, ’the problem with all their arguments is: The more powerful you are, the more likely it is you get the earmark in. Therefore, it is a corrupt system.' Indeed, the most powerful legislators unduly benefited from the return of earmarks,” the Pig Book said.

Retired Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.), who served as the top GOP appropriator in the 117th Congress, received 18 earmarks, with a total cost to taxpayers of more than $666 million. Shelby’s total far exceeded that of another retired Republican senator, Oklahoma’s Jim Inhofe, who had the second-highest total earmark cost and received 63 earmarks valued in excess of $541 million.

“Three more senators rounded out the top five: Senate Appropriations Committee member Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii), who received 72 earmarks costing $529,856,915; Senate Appropriations Committee member Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), who received 134 earmarks costing $489,132,000; and Sen. Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii), who received 36 earmarks costing $449,315,000,” according to the Pig Book.

The top five congressional ear-markers for 2023 account for less than one percent of the 535 members of Congress, but received 10.3 percent of the total cost of all 2023 earmarks. The top five also illustrate how dramatically the reformed earmark system favors senators over representatives.

Only two representatives—Rep. Randy Weber (R-Texas) and Rep. Mike Waltz (R-Fla.)—made the top 50 recipients of 2023 earmarks. Weber ranked 11th among the top 50, getting 10 earmarks worth $288 million, while Waltz got 11 earmarks totaling $177 million, making him 36th among the top 50.

Even with the bipartisan support two years ago for bringing back earmarks, Democrats still demonstrated a marked advantage, according to the Pig Book. Fully 271 of the 275 congressional Democrats sought and received earmarks, worth a total of more than $14 billion, compared to $7.1 billion in earmarks sought and received by 127 of the 275 Republicans.