{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://www.paul.senate.gov/news-sen-rand-paul-highlights-18-billion-wasteful-spending-through-weekly-waste-reports/", "Sen. Rand Paul Highlights $1.8 Billion in Wasteful Spending Through Weekly Waste Reports", "2016-05-24", "2016", "2016-05", "Republican", "Senate", "KY", "Rand Paul", "P000603", "www.paul.senate.gov", "paul", "https://www.paul.senate.gov/news/", "scraper", "WASHINGTON, D.C. \u2013 U.S. Senator Rand Paul this week highlights 52 weeks of \u2018The Waste Report,\u2019 which is an ongoing project cataloguing egregious examples of waste within the U.S. government.\n\nOver the last year alone, the Subcommittee on Federal Spending Oversight and Emergency Management (FSO) under Sen. Paul\u2019s leadership has uncovered over $1.8 billion in wasteful spending on frivolous projects. This level of spending, which equates to nearly $35 million per week, matches the tax liability of approximately 250,000 average American taxpayers.\n\n\u2018The Waste Report\u2019 can be found HERE.\n\nThe most recent edition of \u2018The Waste Report\u2019 focused upon the East-West Center at the University of Hawaii. The center, established in 1960, receives millions in federal funding each year to promote diplomacy with Asian and Pacific islands nations. These nations include China and Japan, two of our nation\u2019s two largest foreign creditors already, from which our government has borrowed $3.4 trillion to cover our annual deficit.\n\nOther examples of wasteful government spending uncovered through \u2018The Waste Report\u2019 include $8 million spent by the Department of Veterans Affairs to purchase solar panels that were never used and $28 million spent on heavy equipment lost by the Department of Defense in Afghanistan.\n\nTo put this in perspective, 250,000 is roughly the number of people living in Durham, NC or Irvine, CA and just below the number of Americans living in Louisville, KY.\n\nIn addition to the $1.8 billion spent on the wasteful projects highlighted in \u2018The Waste Report,\u2019 the March 7th edition of the report stressed the long-term fiscal dangers posed by the ever-growing national debt.\n\nThis year the federal government spent $255 billion for interest on our debt, meaning that every American owes about $800 this year to pay for interest alone. If you consider only those who pay their taxes, this figure rises to $2,700 per taxpayer.\n\nEach week, \u2018The Waste Report\u2019 will continue to release examples of wasteful government spending to show taxpayers where their money is going.", 1, "2026-03-30T01:40:41Z", "2026-04-08T20:51:40Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://www.paul.senate.gov/news-sen-rand-paul-highlights-18-billion-wasteful-spending-through-weekly-waste-reports/"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 1.1830469593405724, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}