It's not even Thanksgiving, and interest groups have already spent more on private congressional travel than in any election year since 2004.
Since January, members and staff have accepted 1,649 trips worth more than $5.6 million, according to a LegiStorm review of official trip disclosures. About half of those travel expenses went toward courting members, who accepted 257 trips worth almost $2.8 million.
That makes 2022 already the highest in election-year travel spending since 2004, when interest groups dropped nearly $10.4 million on member and staff travel. Privately sponsored travel is typically much lower in election years.
Congressional travel halted as the pandemic hit in March 2020 and began to rebound in 2021.
Since then, sponsors have opted to send members and staff on a smaller number of more expensive trips compared to years past. This year, Congress has accepted 1,649 trips at an average cost of $3,400 this year. In 2018, sponsors averaged $2,100 each across 2,079 trips.
That trend is even more pronounced among Democrats, who accepted half the number of trips as Republicans. Democrats' travel averaged nearly $5,000 a piece; Republicans' travel averaged $2,700.
The American Israel Education Foundation ($1.87 million), Former Members of Congress ($460,000) and the Aspen Institute ($330,000) are the year's top spenders.
