WASHINGTON — Rep. David Schweikert (R-Ariz.) fashions himself as a champion of cutting government spending and promoting fiscal responsibility. The vice chair of the Joint Economic Committee, Schweikert regularly rails against excessive spending.
“You see tax receipts are up, but our spending is way up,” he said in an animated House floor speech in late July about the need for fiscal stability. “We’re spending faster than those receipts are going up. Therefore, you get a deficit.”
“We have been borrowing and spending too much for decades,” Schweikert wrote in a July op-ed for The Hill. “The inability to get our fiscal house in order and implement even a semblance of fiscal restraint has led us to where we are today.”
It’s basically all the guy talks about. His congressional website is full of press releases complaining about the debt and excessive spending. He shares posts on social media decrying the government’s “wasteful spending spree.” In August 2020, he boasted that he’d even won an award for his efforts to promote fiscal responsibility.
“It wasn’t the debt ceiling! It was the failure of this body to take our demographics, our spending, seriously!” Schweikert fumed in one House floor speech in March 2023, referring to what caused the U.S. credit rating to be downgraded in 2011. (In fact, Congress’ failure to raise the debt ceiling amid extreme partisan gridlock is what led to the downgrade.)
But a look at Schweikert’s own spending shows he himself has been using lots of taxpayer money to send official mail and communications lately — an uptick that coincides with his congressional seat becoming more competitive. And ironically, many of his taxpayer-funded mailers are about combating “fiscal recklessness” and “out-of-control spending.”
In this Congress alone, which began in Jan. 2023, Schweikert has already spent more than $500,000 in taxpayer money on mass mail and other unsolicited communications like text messages and digital ads. For some context, that’s close to one-third of the roughly $1.68 million he’s spent on all of his official mass communications since he came to Congress in 2011.
Schweikert’s spending on mass mailings in particular has really ticked up in 2024. From January through March, he spent more than $149,000 on mass mailings — more on this than all other members of the Arizona House delegation combined, per a review of their disbursement statements.
From April through June, which is the latest available data on members’ disbursements, Schweikert was the third-highest spender on mass mailings in the Arizona congressional delegation, just behind Republican Reps. Eli Crane and Juan Ciscomani.
So what is he talking about in these taxpayer-funded mailers? Fiscal responsibility!
“My top priorities as your congressman are to FIGHT FOR ECONOMIC GROWTH AND PROSPERITY and ALWAYS PROTECT TAXPAYERS,” reads a mass mailer that went out to Schweikert’s constituents in April.
“WORKING FOR FISCAL RESPONSIBILITY,” screams another of his official taxpayer-funded mailers, this one from March.
In another mailer from December 2023, Schweikert declares, “Congress must pass serious solutions that will ensure the federal government spends money responsibly.”
Some of his mailers talk about other issues, like border security and crime. But boy, does he love talking about responsible government spending.
In still another taxpayer-funded mass mailer in March 2023, Schweikert declares, “There is no single greater threat to the future of our country than out of control spending and borrowing.”
The Arizona Republican isn’t just spending taxpayer money on physical pieces of mail to promote his commitment to fiscal responsibility.In May 2024, his congressional office paid to send text messages to his constituents calling out excessive government spending.
“Do you know just how much the federal government borrows per second?” reads the message. “It’s Rep. David Schweikert here to let you in on our platform that sends a daily update with up-to-date spending numbers.”
“I believe through stopping wasteful government spending … we can build a healthier economy,” reads part of a Facebook ad Schweikert used taxpayer money to place in June 2021.
Schweikert began spending dramatically more taxpayer money on mass mailers right around the time his congressional district was redrawn in Jan. 2022 and became more difficult for him to hold.
In 2021, the Arizona Republican spent about $108,000 on taxpayer-funded mass mailings and communications. That amount jumped to roughly $353,000 in 2022, declined somewhat to the still-high amount of about $250,000 in 2023, and is back up to roughly $291,000 as of the end of June 2024.
Schweikert’s district, which covers the northern suburbs of Phoenix, is considered a toss-up in the November election. By all appearances, he’s been leaning on taxpayer-funded mailers for some free advertising in the midst of his tough reelection campaign.
There is certainly precedent for members of Congress doing this: In 2016, Roll Call reviewed spending data from vulnerable lawmakers and found that they spent almost three times as much on taxpayer-funded mail, on average, as those running in safe districts.
Neither Schweikert’s campaign nor his congressional office responded to requests for comment on why he’s been spending so much taxpayer money on mass mailers lately, or how he squares his dramatic uptick in spending with his proud reputation as a fiscal hawk.
Members of Congress are allowed to use taxpayer money to send mail that relates to their official duties, but it’s illegal if they use this money for political activities. In Schweikert’s case, at least one of his official mailers as a congressmanincludes partisan messages similar to his campaign language.
In March 2024, Schweikert spent taxpayer dollars on a mass mailer promoting his work on “economic growth and prosperity,” “border security,” and on “reducing crime.” Here’s what one side of his two-page mailer looks like:
Meanwhile, the “issues” page of Schweikert’s campaign website breaks out his priorities as a candidate: “economic growth and prosperity,” “reducing taxes,” “stopping illegal immigration,” and “protecting our freedom.”
Some of Schweikert’s other official communications seem blatantly political.
In August 2021, he spent taxpayer money on a mass email titled “Pro-Life August Update,” in which he boasts of his support for a bill that would ban abortion nationwide, the Life At Conception Act. He’s cosponsored that bill six times, and that mass email went out at a time when calls for a nationwide abortion ban were more political rhetoric than support for apractical possibility. Texas enacted its extreme restrictions on abortion in September 2021, and theSupreme Court didn’t overturn the national right to abortion until June 2022.
In another taxpayer-funded mass mailer in August 2023, the Arizona Republican urged veterans to take advantage of benefits offered by the PACT Act, a law that provides expanded health care to veterans exposed to toxic burn pits.
Schweikert voted against the bill in March 2022, when the bill initially passed the House, and again in July 2022, when its language ultimately became law.
He does not mention that he opposed the bill in his newsletter to constituents. In fact, he creates the impression that he supported it.
“I wanted to provide a few updates on my work this past week for the residents of Arizona’s First Congressional District,” Schweikert says in the newsletter. It prominently features an image of a military service member and gives details on how veterans can apply for PACT Act benefits.
“You don’t want to miss out on this opportunity!” he says later.
Schweikert is running against Democrat Amish Shah, a former state lawmaker. Shah’s campaign did not respond to a request for comment.
