- Michigan lawmakers agree to earmark reform that will require the to publicly disclose requests 45 days before final budget votes
- Lawmakers have spent billions on pet projects in recent years with little oversight or public review
- The reform measure is now headed to Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s desk for expected signature
LANSING — Legislators agreed to formally overhaul Michigan’s earmark process on Thursday, forcing lawmakers to publicly disclose proposed spending on individual projects 45 days before final budget votes.
The reforms come on the heels of several scandals over allegedly misspent or embezzled funds awarded during spreading sprees by the Legislature. In recent years, billions of dollars in earmarks were added to state budgets, often shortly before late-night votes.
The two chambers had been at something of an impasse over how much advance notice to require. The Democrat-controlled Senate had initially proposed a 10-day disclosure period, while the GOP-majority House wanted 90 days but most recently had approved a 60-day plan.
They settled on 45 days, and allowed legislators who submitted earmark requests in the first year of a legislative session to use them the next year without resubmitting the requests.
The compromise bill passed the both chambers unanimously on Thursday, although nine House members did not vote. The measure now heads to Gov. Gretchen Whitmer for her expected signature.
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“This is the most important ethics, accountability and transparency legislation to pass through the Legislature and be signed by the governor in years,” House Speaker Matt Hall, R-Richland Township told reporters after it passed, calling it “the hardest thing I think that I’ve done as a legislator.”
Hall said it was “it was very difficult to get the politicians to agree to real transparency.”
In prior budgets, earmarks were often included at the eleventh hour in the budget’s final version, leaving effectively no time for public review of what was in some years more than $1 billion in spending, without any information about who sponsored the grants and who will receive the money.
Under the bill, future earmark requests will have to include:
- All the sponsors’ names
- Who will receive the money
- The purpose of the grant
- The amount of the request
- Information about the organization that’ll receive the funds, if a nonprofit. For-profit businesses couldn’t receive grants.
The requests would be posted online for the public to view.
Earmarks, also known as pork-barrel spending and formally called legislatively directed spending items, are individual grants to specific projects, typically within an individual lawmaker’s district.
The process has received increased scrutiny in recent years amid a series of scandals.
One wayward earmark in 2022 led to criminal charges, another is the subject of an ongoing criminal investigation and others have come after the eventual recipient of the cash donated prolifically to lawmakers.
In the former case, David Coker, a former aide to then-House Speaker Jason Wentworth, allegedly used a nonprofit he created during 2022 budget negotiations to embezzle more than $100,000 of a $25 million earmark for a health and fitness park in Clare.
A preliminary exam in Coker’s criminal case is scheduled to begin Wednesday.
A separate $20 million grant in the same budget bill also remains under investigation after revelations emerged, first reported by The Detroit News, that the money was awarded to a nonprofit created by a Michigan Economic Development Corporation board member and Whitmer ally, Fay Beydoun, who spent large sums on air travel, lodging and an expensive coffee maker.
The legislation approved Thursday would prohibit grants to newly formed nonprofits like those created by Coker and Beydoun. Only nonprofits that had operated in the state for three years and had a physical office could qualify.
For years, there were no public reporting requirements for earmarks. That changed under the Democrat-controlled state government trifecta in 2023 and 2024, when legislators promised to voluntarily disclose information about earmarks — but only months after the budgets became law.
“I think these bills are a huge improvement from the current process, which has historically been corrupt and terrible,” said Rep. Jason Morgan, an Ann Arbor Democrat. He called the amount of earmarks in past budgets “obscene and simply too much.”
The Legislature struggled to pass a budget this year by the Oct. 1 deadline established by the Michigan Constitution. The process was complicated by a House requirement that all earmarks comport with rules they passed this year, forcing lawmakers to pass a stop-gap spending bill after a new fiscal year began without a completed budget.
Part of the budget deal ultimately forged with Whitmer included an agreement to codify in state law a new earmark disclosure process that both legislative chambers will have to follow, according to Hall.
The budget Whitmer signed last month included about $160 million in earmarks, down significantly from more than $600 million in the budget passed in 2024 and more than more than $1 billion in 2023.
Morgan said fewer earmarks allowed policymakers to focus state resources elsewhere.
“Because we did less earmarks this term or this budget, we were able to invest in local roads and public transit and make sure we had an adequate school budget,” Morgan said.
The earmark rules adopted earlier this year by the House also required all legislative requests to be discussed in a public committee hearing. That is not part of the bill heading to Whitmer’s desk.
Hall had called the Senate’s original plan to require 10-days advance notice on earmark requests “a joke” and vowed to block any Senate bills in his chamber until a deal on the reform plan, which he called part of his Hall Ethics, Accountability and Transparency plan — “HEAT.”
Shortly after the Senate approved the 45-day disclosure requirement on Thursday, the House took up and passed a slew of Senate-originated legislation.
Attorney General Dana Nessel and Whitmer had also called for earmark reforms, though Whitmer had suggested only five days’ advance notice. In a recent podcast appearance, Whitmer called the current earmark process “gross” and pledged to ensure it was changed.
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