Despite his conservatism, Flake has also bucked the GOP on a number of issues. He was one of a minority of Republicans to vote against Bush's 2001 No Child Left Behind education bill and his prescription drug bill two years later Almanac of American Politics, 2008 edition. Flake sided with the Bush administration and against many House Republicans in backing a guest-worker program for illegal immigrants, as well as a path to U.S. citizenship

The Economy

A hard-liner on federal spending, Flake voted against both the $700 billion Wall Street bailout package in October 2008 and the $787 billion stimulus bill in February 2009. In opposing the financial rescue, he warned of "unintended consequences" and said the legislation would "fundamentally alter the relationship between the federal government and the private sector." "Once we go down this road," he said in a statement, "it's going to be very difficult to turn back."

Flake has also opposed plans to nationalize U.S. banks and the government bailouts for American auto companies. He criticized the stimulus bill in 2009 as "little more than a grab bag of liberal programs, projects, and policies that Congressional Democrats have wanted to institute for years."

Earmark Reform

After campaigning on fiscal restraint in 2000, Flake requested several earmarks during his first term in the House. But when fellow members of the Arizona delegation in 2003 passed around a letter requesting $14.3 million for a local Air Force base, Flake declined to sign it. He told the Arizona Republic that he had decided never again to request an earmark

Flake would retain the option of asking various House committees to consider projects for funding, but his decision to forgo actual earmark requests soon came to define his political image. It also drew him criticism from some in his district, who argued that it was part of his job to bring home his constituents' share of federal dollars.

Ignoring those complaints, Flake further seized on the issue by publicly denouncing earmark requests of fellow House members, making what were largely unsuccessful efforts to remove them from spending bills. "The earmarking process is fraught with a lack of transparency, fiscal responsibility and equity for taxpayers," he told the Los Angeles Times in 2007, "all too often rewarding the districts of powerful members of Congress in the Appropriations Committee at the expense of the rest of the body."

Flake gained even more attention when he targeted projects eyed by leaders of his own party, as in 2006 when he tried to strip out a defense earmark requested by then-Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.). Flake routinely shrugs off the ire of his colleagues, characterizing his crusade against earmarks as a mark of his political independence.

After Democrats won control of Congress in 2007, lawmakers approved reforms that require that sponsors of earmarks be publicly identified. But Flake was one of just eight House members to vote against the bill that instituted the change, criticizing the law as watered-down reform and ineffective.

He pushed unsuccessfully for a moratorium on earmarks in 2008, though he applauded President Bush's executive order in January 2008 directing federal agencies to ignore earmarks not included in the full text of legislation. In May 2009, Flake introduced legislation that would bar for-profit entities from being awarded earmarks.

Expanding his target list in 2009, Flake spent months pushing for a House Ethics Committee investigation into the lobbying firm PMA Group, which had ties to several senior House Democrats including Defense Appropriations Subcommittee Chairman John P. Murtha (D-Pa.). The ethics panel said in June 2009 that it had launched a preliminary inquiry into the matter.

Cuba Policy

Breaking with many Republicans and the Bush administration, Flake is a vocal critic of the long-standing trade embargo with Cuba. He has pushed for diplomatic engagement with the Castro regime and argues that easing the embargo along with travel restrictions is the best way to achieve democratic reforms in Cuba. Flake applauded President Obama's decision in April 2009 to lift some travel restrictions to the island. "One would expect the Cuban government to tell its citizens where they can and can't travel, but for our government to impose similar restrictions has never made sense," he said in a statement.

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