The first Congressional discussion of the Earmark Transparency Act will take place today when the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Government Affairs debates the bill at a business meeting at 2:30 p.m.

The bill, S.3335, was introduced last month by Sens. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., John McCain, R-Ariz., Russ Feingold, D-Wisc., and Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., and would require a centralized, detailed, downloadable database that would track every earmark that members of Congress requested.

Earmarks are federal funds provided by Congress for projects that circumvent the merit-based or competitive allocation processes or curtail the executive branch from ...