Boehner pressures Obama to veto $1.1 trillion omnibus spending bill

Incoming House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) asked President Obama to veto the omnibus spending bill set to make its way through Congress.

Boehner, pointing to Obama's recent statements in support of a ban on the practice of earmarking, pressured the president to reject the $1.1 trillion spending bill because of the numerous earmarks contained in it.

"If President Obama is truly serious about ending earmarks, he should oppose Senate Democrats’ pork-laden omnibus spending bill and announce he will veto it if necessary," Boehner said in a statement.

Republicans have been ramping up their attacks on the legislation, introduced this week by Senate Democrats, that would fund the government through 2011.

"I am actively working to defeat it. I think there are many Senate members who have provisions in it for their states who are also actively working to defeat it," Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said Tuesday. "This bill should not go forward."

Congressional Republicans are instead pushing a much more modest bill that would fund the government for a few months, and let the empowered GOP Congress next year pick up the slack instead.

The current omnibus bill cobbles together spending contained in several other bills that never received congressional action this year. That means that earmarks inserted by both Democrats and Republicans are in the omnibus, because the basic legislation was crafted before House and Senate Republicans adopted their earmark moratorium.

"Instead of making reckless spending decisions in the waning days of the lame-duck session, Senate Democrats should stand down so we can get to work on cleaning up Washington’s fiscal mess," Boehner said.