President Joe Biden kicked off the fiscal 2024 appropriations process last week with a budget request that renewed a proposal to eliminate funding for the construction of a new federal prison in eastern Kentucky.
But that project is in the district of Republican Rep. Harold Rogers, a longtime influential appropriator who is now chairman of the Commerce-Justice-Science panel, which oversees funding levels for the Justice Department.
While Rogers has a track record of backing funding for space exploration and the fight against opioids, the onetime chairman of the full House Appropriations Committee also has been called the “Prince of Pork” for earmark spending that goes to his home state.
