Republican lawmakers who shunned stimulus lobbied for funds behind the scenes

Scores of Republican lawmakers--including tea party stars Reps. Michele Bachmann of Minnesota and Ron Paul of Texas--privately sought out funds from the government's $787 billion stimulus program even while publicly denouncing it as a failure. The Center for Public Integrity has a comprehensive report on scores of politicians whom the watchdog group says it caught in stimulus "hypocrisy."

Take, for example, Texas GOP Rep. Pete Sessions, who called the stimulus a "spending spree" that would fail to create jobs. The center's report says Sessions was among the lawmakers who wrote to the federal agencies to ask for the funds precisely to help create jobs back in their home districts.

A few more GOP politicians who worked behind the scenes to secure stimulus money: Sen. Scott Brown of Massachusetts, Sen. John McCain of Arizona, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky and Rep. Mike Pence of Indiana.

In all, the center reports, five members of the Republican congressional leadership lobbied for stimulus funds.

The report also finds that the Democratic leadership's promise that the bill would have no earmarks for special pet projects proved well shy of the truth. Politicians have "lettermarked" special projects in the legislation instead--a semantic difference that involves lawmakers writing directly to agencies and asking them to set aside money for their projects, rather than hurriedly appending the outlays in the final stages of the legislative process. McCain, who is among the Senate's fiercest public opponents of earmarking, wrote to the Department of Transportation in an attempt to lettermark funds for Phoenix.

The center created an application where you can access all the letters written by lawmakers soliciting funds for their districts.

(Photo of Bachmann: Getty)