Clinton directs $303,000 earmark to group that encourages HIV/AIDS victims as immigrants to U.S.

The Gay Men's Health Crisis Center, a group that lobbies for needle exchanges, for allowing immigrants with HIV/AIDS to legally enter the country, and for condom distribution in prisons, has received a $303,000 in U.S. federal funds in an earmark pushed by Senator Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.).

The earmark funding came through the $555 billion FY 2008 omnibus bill. Clinton's 261 earmarks contrasts dramatically with those of other presidential candidates. Of those still in the primary race, Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) had 46 earmarks, Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas) had 10 earmarks, Rep. Dennis Kucinich had 9 earmarks and Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) had no earmarks, said an analysis by the watchdog group Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW). Under ethics reform legislation passed last year, 2008 is the first year that members of Congress have to put their names on earmarks.

This particular earmark is from the Department of Justice and is specifically aimed at fighting methamphetamine use. Clinton announced the grant in October 2007, a month after receiving a $750 donation and a $250 donation from Felix Lopez, an attorney for the Gay Men's Health Crisis and for a clinic based in New York.

The Gay Men's Health Crisis Center, based in New York City, has a public policy agenda for the federal, state, and city level that includes a needle exchange program to curb the spread of HIV, allowing non-profit groups to distribute condoms for free throughout prisons, and opposition to abstinence-only sex education. The group says its top legislative agenda item at the federal level involves changing immigration policy to eliminate HIV/AIDS as grounds for inadmissibility as a disease of public health significance.