All told, Toomey got at least three earmarks that year, according to news releases archived on his old congressional website. He served in Congress from 1999 to 2005.
Besides Air Products, he secured $1 million for a freight-transfer center that Bethlehem Steel Corp. was building as part of the redevelopment of its defunct Bethlehem mill. He also won $5 million for Navy research on double-hulled shipbuilding at Lehigh University.
Toomey has attacked Sestak on earmarks. Most recently, he criticized the Democrat for seeking $350,000 this year for a nonprofit foundation linked to a for-profit corporation to develop a new type of wind turbine, contrary to a House ethics rule. Toomey has also blasted Sestak for raising nearly $120,000 in campaign contributions from earmark recipients since entering Congress, though he had pledged not to on his campaign website.
"Congressman Toomey is a typical politician who attacks his opponents on earmarks but refuses to tell Pennsylvanians the truth about who he got earmarks for," said Sestak spokesman Jonathon Dworkin, calling on Toomey to release all of his old requests. "What is he hiding? And why does he think that he should be held to a different standard than everyone else?"
'Enough'
New rules established in the last two years require disclosure of lawmakers' earmark requests, and the House has also banned earmarks to for-profit companies. Previously, requests were made in secret and it was not always possible to tell who was sponsoring one - unless a member of Congress bragged about it publicly.
