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SALT LAKE CITY — Rep. Mia Love is renewing her efforts to increase congressional transparency through single-subject bills with clear titles.
The Utah Republican introduced the bill last year to curb the practice of passing complicated, multifaceted bills or attaching unrelated items to crucial appropriations bills.
Love's goal has been to force legislation to pass or fail on its own merits, while increasing the transparency of policymaking.
The bill reflects similar policy in 42 states, including Utah, which require legislation passed at the state level to follow this method of simplicity and transparency with one subject and an accurate title to reflect the proposed policy.
Attaching extra items to last-minute bills causes problems, Love said.
"It puts members in the position to vote for something that they said they would never vote for that is attached to something that they promised they always would vote for," she said Thursday on KSL Newsradio's "The Doug Wright Show."
Love said complicated bills contribute greatly to the growth of the national debt and decrease transparency.
"There are all these projects that are having to be put on to must-pass legislation in order to get a certain bill through," she said. "There are tons of bills in Congress that would never stand on their own."
While the original bill did not pass last year's attempt, Love said she believes there's more support for the measure and she has voiced a determination in continuing to push the legislation until it passes.
Critics may argue that the measure would slow the lawmaking process and require too many bills, but Love said it would force Congress to reprioritize its efforts.
An added benefit in the proposed bill, she said, is making legislation easier for the public to follow. Love warned of an overreliance on legal experts and policy think tanks to examine and dissect legislation to determine its benefits.
Love said she believes her bill would help people to determine the benefits of certain bills on their own and contact their representatives accordingly rather than rely on experts to pore through thousands of pages of documents.
