Members of Congress and their aides took 23,000 trips financed by corporations, trade associations and other private groups over a 5 1/2-year period, a study released Monday found.
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Congressional travelers often took trips to popular destinations, with 200 visits to Paris, 150 to Hawaii and 140 to Italy, said Wendell Rawls, acting executive director of the Center for Public Integrity, a watchdog group.
The price tag totaled at least $50 million from January 2000 through June 2005, Rawls said.
For the study, researchers gathered information from 25,000 disclosure forms, which are required for lawmakers and their staffs when taking trips.
The priciest was a trip to London in 2000 for then-Rep. Thomas Bliley Jr. (R-Va.) and his wife. The $31,171 trip was sponsored by Brown & Williamson Tobacco.
American Public Media was a partner in the study, which also was conducted by Northwestern University’s Medill News Service.
Paul Miller, chief lobbyist for the American League of Lobbyists, discounted the revelations of congressional trips.
“I don’t see a problem with the travel,” he said. “Nobody’s advocating for all these fancy trips to Scotland,” he said of the famous golf junkets arranged by convicted lobbyist Jack Abramoff.
“But those are very few and I think everyone agrees we can do away with those,” Miller said, adding that similar bills passed by the House and Senate would tighten rules for private trips.