Tapping States for Backchannel Budget
Scofflaw U.S. Agency Taps States For Its Backchannel Budget VENTURA, Calif. (February 4, 2022) – History is replete with cautionary tales about federal government enterprises with unchecked funding sources – that is, those outside the annual congressional appropriations process. One alternately funded enterprise was nicknamed “The Little Green House on ‘K’ Street.” Harry Daugherty, President Harding’s attorney general, set up the organization to accomplish ad hoc goals. It became a den of corruption that led to the Teapot Dome scandal. A half-century later, H. R. “Bob” Haldeman, President Nixon’s chief of staff, set up a similar off-the-books enterprise called the...