Coburn on Disaster Aid Bill: “Typical Washington B.S.”

This will be a story to watch in the coming days and weeks…

From The Huffington Post Posted: 05/23/2013 10:20 am EDT  |  Updated: 05/23/2013 10:49 am EDT

WASHINGTON — Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) fired back Thursday at those who have criticized him for demanding that any disaster aid package for Oklahoma tornado victims include offsets, or matching spending cuts elsewhere in the budget. The money is already available to help his constituents, Coburn argued, suggesting that lawmakers only want to pass an unpaid-for disaster aid package so they can tuck other unrelated items in it to benefit their home states.

“It’s just typical Washington B.S.,” Coburn said during an interview on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.” “There’s $11.6 billion sitting in a bank account waiting to help people in Oklahoma … It’s a crass political game because I was being asked these questions before we even pulled the dead people out of the rubble.”

Coburn, one of the most fiscally conservative lawmakers in Congress, is right about $11.6 billion being available. But it’s not because he had anything to do with it. Congress approved $18.5 billion for disaster relief for 2013, with most of those funds — $11.5 billion — approved after Hurricane Sandy. Coburn vocally opposed both packages, but lawmakers decided then none of that emergency aid should be subject to offsets. The amount of money left in that fund is at about $11.6 billion, which means it can be pulled to respond to the Oklahoma storm — without offsets.

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