White House Wants Clean Spending Bills

White House spokesman Jay Carney today decried efforts by House Republicans to attach controversial policy riders to a package of funding bills making their way through Congress.

Riders are essentially amendments inserted into bills by individual lawmakers who wish to bypass the traditional committee process, which generally involves holding hearings into the legislation at hand.

The blog OMB Watch found that a trio of “minibus” spending bills set to be taken up by the Senate contain 60 riders within them. The add-ons range from de-funding President Obama’s healthcare law, to prohibiting the administration from regulating greenhouse gas emissions.

(Click here for OMB Watch’s full report).

During today’s briefing with reporters, Carney took issue with a particular GOP rider that would repeal key components of the Dodd-Frank financial reform law signed by Obama last year.

“Many Americans, if they were aware of this kind of activity, would be appalled by it,” Carney said. “We’re gonna insist that Wall Street reform be implemented, and that it not be watered down or repealed.”

Carney suggested that Dodd-Frank was partly to credit for Bank of America’s decision today to scrap plans to impose $5 banking fees on customers that use debit cards.

BoA announced the new monthly fee back in September in response to a provision within the law that limited the amount of cash banks can charge retailers who accept credit card purchases. However, Carney noted that the plan sparked outrage on the part of customers, which likely led to BoA abandoning its effort.