The government's wish list is a waste.
Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, on Tuesday released a list of dubious government spending that includes millions for training pigs to play video games, underwater whack-a-mole for dolphins, and concocting edible insect entrees for human consumption.
Ernst is demanding the public get "accountability for those kinds of projects" — and announced legislation to require every researcher relying on federal funding to reveal taxpayers' role in support of the project.
"Unexplainable expenditures like these really bug taxpayers, yet they keep popping up because no one really knows where the trillions of dollars being doled out every year by Washington are actually going. That is entirely intentional," Ernst said in a statement.
"Biden's budgeting is a lot like Whack-a-Mole. He keeps digging the country deeper in the hole while doing everything he can — including ignoring the law — to hide Washington's waste so it doesn't get whacked."
The Cost Openness and Spending Transparency Act will require projects funded with taxpayer money to display the costs associated with the project, the Iowa Torch reported.
Under the legislation, projects would be regularly reviewed, and taxpayers would be given a process to report federal agencies who are not transparent about how their funding is spent.
The news outlet noted the examples pointed to as wasteful included a Department of Agriculture grant for a Purdue University study in which researchers taught pigs how to play video games.
Another example Ernst provided was a National Science Foundation grant of $447,592 to Rockefeller University and a $352,403 grant to City University of New York for a research project that included developing an underwater touchpad with "dolphin-friendly apps" to investigate dolphin intelligence and communication.
Ernst also pointed out that the Department of Agriculture, Department of Interior, General Services Administration, and the Small Business Administration spent over $4 million supporting the set-up of insect farms and the production of bug-based foods for human consumption and children's nutrition.
Justin Goodman, senior vice president for advocacy and public policy at the White Coat Waste Project, told the Washington Times that Ernst is a "waste warrior."
"We already know that dolphins and pigs are smart. The white coats wasting taxpayer dollars to teach animals to play video games are the ones who need intelligence tests," he told the news outlet.
Fran Beyer ✉
Fran Beyer is a writer with Newsmax and covers national politics.
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