After petitioner Sabri offered three separate bribes to a Minneapolis councilman to facilitate construction in the city, Sabri was charged with violating 18 U. S. C. §666(a)(2), which proscribes bribery of state and local officials of entities, such as Minneapolis, that receive at least $10,000 in federal funds. Before trial, Sabri moved to dismiss the indictment on the ground that §666(a)(2) is unconstitutional on its face for failure to require proof of a connection between the federal funds and the alleged bribe, as an element of liability. The District Court agreed, but the Eighth Circuit reversed, holding that the absence of such an express requirement was not fatal, and that the statute was constitutional under the Constitutions Necessary and Proper Clause in serving the objects of the congressional spending power.

Held: Section 666(a)(2) is a valid exercise of Congresss Article I authority. Pp. 3-9.

(a) Sabris "facial" challenge that §666(a)(2) must, as an element of the offense, require proof of connection with federal money is readily rejected. This Court does not presume the unconstitutionality of all federal criminal statutes from the absence of an explicit jurisdictional hook, and there is no occasion even to consider the need for such a requirement where there is no reason to suspect that enforcing a criminal statute would extend beyond a legitimate interest cognizable under Article I, §8. Congress has Spending Clause authority to appropriate federal moneys to promote the general welfare, Art. I, §8, cl. 1, and corresponding Necessary and Proper Clause authority, Art. I, §8, cl. 18, to assure that taxpayer dollars appropriated under that power are in fact spent for the general welfare, rather than frittered away in graft or upon projects undermined by graft. See, e.g., McCulloch v. Maryland, 4 Wheat. 316. Congress does not have to accept the risk of getting poor performance for its money, owing to local and state administrators improbity. See, e.g., id., at 417. Section 666(a)(2) addresses the problem at the sources of bribes, by rational means, to safeguard the integrity of federal dollar recipients. Although not every bribe offered or paid to covered government agents will be traceably skimmed from specific federal payments, or be found in the guise of a quid pro quo for some dereliction in spending a federal grant, these facts do not portend enforcement beyond the scope of federal interest, for the simple reason that corruption need not be so limited in order to affect that interest. Money is fungible, bribed officials are untrustworthy stewards of federal funds, and corrupt contractors do not deliver dollar-for-dollar value. It is enough that the statute condition the offense on a threshold amount of federal dollars to the government such as that provided here and a bribe that goes well beyond liquor and cigars. The legislative history confirms that §666(a)(2) is an instance of necessary and proper legislation. Neither of Sabris arguments against §666(a)(2)s constitutionality helps him. First, his claim that §666 is of a piece with the legislation ruled unconstitutional in United States v. Lopez, 514 U. S. 549, and United States v. Morrison, 529 U. S. 598, is unavailing because these precedents do not control here. In them, the Court struck down federal statutes regulating gun possession near schools and gender-motivated violence, respectively, because it found the effects of those activities on interstate commerce insufficiently robust. Here, in contrast, Congress was within its prerogative to ensure that the objects of spending are not menaced by local administrators on the take. Cf. Lopez, supra, at 561. Second, contrary to Sabris argument, §666(a)(2) is not an unduly coercive, and impermissibly sweeping, condition on the grant of federal funds, but is autho