Top House Democrats want to revive the spending practice that allows members to request money for specific projects. It has been effectively banned since 2011.

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House Democrats are planning a change to the way Congress spends taxpayer money. Earmarks, which let lawmakers request money for projects, could be making a comeback. They were effectively banned in 2011 after a series of scandals. Here's NPR congressional correspondent Susan Davis.

SUSAN DAVIS, BYLINE: Back when earmarks were a regular feature of congressional life, Missouri Democratic Congressman Emanuel Cleaver said Republicans and Democrats could cut more deals.

EMANUEL CLEAVER: This used to be a time everybody was hallelujah. I mean, Republicans, Democrats dancing, kissing, you know, just - this was, like, the time to be saved.

DAVIS: Cleaver served on a bipartisan committee established last year to examine how to make Congress work better. One of the conclusions in their final report - bring back earmarks. The panel's recommendations were weighed after hearing testimony from advocates like John Hudak of the Brookings Institution, who's long argued the earmark ban overcorrected the problem.

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JOHN HUDAK: Earmarks were painted as a coven for corruption, a practice reserved for the funding of needless projects to benefit the friends, supporters and donors of members of Congress. Much of this was hyperbole, as earmarking was abused only by a handful of members in the past.

DAVIS: House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer is leading the effort to reinstate them with limits and more transparency. He argues the ban didn't even stop earmarks. It just transferred that spending power from Congress, where it constitutionally belongs, to the executive branch, where it doesn't.

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STENY HOYER: And my belief is that members of Congress elected from 435 districts around the country know, frankly, better than those who may be in Washington what their districts need.

DAVIS: In the past decade, both parties have attempted and failed to reinstate member earmarks because of concerns about how it would play politically. Now there's broad support from House Democratic leaders, including Majority Whip James Clyburn and incoming House Appropriations Committee Chair Rosa DeLauro of Connecticut. She told NPR she thinks this time it could stick.

ROSA DELAURO: It's dynamic. It is a dynamic environment. And I think we are in a better position now to move forward in this area.

DAVIS: Steve Ellis runs Taxpayers for Common Sense, a budget watchdog group. He's more skeptical.

STEVE ELLIS: House Democrats can push as much as they want, but they're going to have to have a dance partner in the Senate, and they're going to have to have a dance partner with the Republicans. And it's one of these things where it just won't stand politically and optically if they don't all jump together.

DAVIS: Senate Republicans voted to permanently ban earmarks just last year, but control of the Senate won't be clear until after a pair of Georgia special elections in early January. Missouri Republican Senator Roy Blunt, a longtime appropriator, made it clear the Senate's not currently rushing to join with House Democrats.

ROY BLUNT: I don't think senators are thinking about this much until it's clear what the House really intends to do.

DAVIS: Vermont Senator Patrick Leahy, the top Democrat on the Senate Appropriations Committee, supports bringing back earmarks. And he says, in private, the idea is quite popular.

PATRICK LEAHY: Oh, yes. And there's very quiet support for it - the Republicans. But there will be some opposed, but they don't have to have earmarks if they don't like them.

DAVIS: Former President Barack Obama opposed earmarks, famously pledging to veto any bill that came to his desk that included them. President-elect Joe Biden hasn't weighed in yet. Biden says he wants to bring Republicans and Democrats together, and that's the promise of earmarks.

Susan Davis, NPR News, Washington.

(SOUNDBITE OF TIMOTHY INFINITE'S "DOBLE") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.