Bachmann is pushing for an expansion of Interstate 94 in her district in Minnesota. | REUTERS Bachmann pushes road project

A moratorium on congressional earmarks isn’t stopping Rep. Michele Bachmann from pushing for federal funding for a home-state highway.

The Minnesota Republican held an event in St. Paul for expanding Interstate 94 in her district, and has been lobbying the House Transportation Committee Chairman Bill Shuster (R-Pa.) to fund $25 million for the project. A Minnesota newspaper quoted her this week saying the initiative was gaining “traction” with the chairman.


But it’s not clear what that “traction” could mean in the face of the moratorium against congressionally directed spending on specific projects, and on Thursday she told POLITICO that her conversations with the powerful Pennsylvanian aren’t about asking for an earmark, but “raising awareness.”

“It’s a very important issue for people in the district. And I’ve talked to him to put it on his radar screen to let him know this is something we’d like to see,” Bachmann said. “I’m not talking for an earmark. We have rules in the House of how we deal with this.”

Bachmann estimated that she and Shuster have had three or four conversations about the need to add lanes to the highway. But Shuster seemed less enthused about funding it, and his options under current House rules may be limited to only advocating for the project or trying to approve a study of Minnesota’s gridlock.

“She wants me to meet with some group in Minnesota, but I don't know the details,” Shuster said. He added that Bachmann has not asked for an earmark “to this point.”

Erich Zimmermann, a transportation policy analyst with watchdog group Taxpayers for Common Sense, said this push from Bachmann is common in Congress, where members want to showcase their efforts for home-district voters.

“Most of this is just posturing. I think she full on knows it’s hard to get money specified for the project,” Zimmermann said. “I don’t think it’s unique to her … most people aren't paying attention to the earmark rules in Congress.”

Zimmermann said there’s a sense in Congress that an earmark ban could be reinstated, which may be a motivator for Bachmann’s push.

“Members need to appear to be fighting in whatever way possible,” Zimmermann said. “Some of it comes down to a belief among members that earmarks can and will come back.”

It’s a tricky issue for Bachmann, who has focused on local concerns in the past year since dropping out of the presidential race and eking out reelection to the House. She raised eyebrows three years ago when the House and Senate began considering the earmark moratorium , arguing that transportation projects do not equal earmarks.

“I don’t believe that building roads and bridges and interchanges should be considered an earmark,” Bachmann told the Star-Tribune in 2010. “There’s a big difference between funding a tea pot museum and a bridge.”

But on Thursday the Minnesota congresswoman wouldn’t say whether she still believed transportation projects such as the I-94 expansion should be exempted from the moratorium.

“That’s another conversation for another day,” she said. During her conversations with Shuster, she added that she’s “acting within the rules and parameters of the conference.”

Bachmann spearheaded the formation of a bipartisan, bicameral congressional coalition of House and Senate members last year to pass a law that exempted a new Stillwater Bridge between Minnesota and Wisconsin from some environmental reviews, but that legislation did not offer funding for the project.

It did include an offset to allocate $8 million leftover from a 2005 earmark, according to the Congressional Budget Office. Zimmermann called that bill an “earmark enabler.”

The bill passed the House with 339 votes — including that of Rep. Nick Rahall (D-W.Va.), who called Republican support for the bill “befuddling” considering the anti-earmark dogma among conservatives.

“It looks like an earmark, walks like an earmark, quacks like an earmark,” Rahall said then. “And I’m not against earmarks.”

This article first appeared on POLITICO Pro at 3:36 p.m. on March 21, 2013.