McConnell now backs earmark ban

WASHINGTON - Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, faced with the influence of lawmakers elected with tea party support, dropped his opposition to a plan by House Republican leaders to ban budget "earmarks" for lawmakers' pet projects.

The Kentucky Republican, who has supported such projects in the past, said Monday he did not apologize for his efforts to channel federal money to his home state for "vital projects." Still, he said it was clear voters want both parties to be serious about cutting spending.

"Nearly every day that the Senate's been in session for the past two years, I have come down to this spot and said that Democrats are ignoring the wishes of the American people," he said. "I won't be guilty of the same thing."

President Obama in a statement welcomed McConnell's decision.

McConnell spoke as Congress returned for a lame-duck session after the Nov. 2 election, in which the GOP gained six seats in the Senate and took control of the House with a gain of at least 60 seats.

The Senate Republican caucus will meet Tuesday to pick leaders for the new Congress and vote on a proposal by Sen. Jim DeMint of South Carolina to ban lawmakers from proposing legislative earmarks that direct spending to specific projects, usually in their home states.

The caucus includes five newly elected Republicans backed by DeMint's Senate Conservatives Fund. They will be eligible to vote on the earmarks issue even though they don't take their seats in the Senate until January.

McConnell's switch on the issue signaled a recognition that DeMint and the people he helped elect, including Rand Paul of Kentucky, are a political force in the Senate.

In Kentucky's GOP primary, Paul beat a candidate McConnell backed, Trey Grayson, for the nomination to fill the seat to be vacated by Republican Jim Bunning, who is retiring. "It's symbolic of waste up here," Paul said of earmarks.