In the nearly seven years since we last looked at President Barack Obama's promise to return congressional earmarks to their 1994 level, a lot has happened. Enough, in fact, to turn a Promise Broken into a Promise Kept.

The progress on earmarks is largely due to the efforts of congressional Republicans rather than Obama himself.

An earmark is a requirement that money approved by Congress be spent in a specific way at the request of a lawmaker. Critics have long argued that earmarks are likelier to serve the interest of a particular congressional district or constituent group than the national good. That's why Obama promised to curb their use.

When we last checked this promise in February 2010, earmarks had not fallen below their 1994 level of $7.8 billion a year.

But in the 2010 elections, the Republicans won control of the House and implemented a moratorium on earmarks that remains in force. The Senate, then controlled by Democrats, also announced a moratorium, and that has continued under the chamber's Republican majority that took power after the 2014 elections.

The enactment of the moratorium has proven "satisfactory" to Taxpayers for Common Sense, one of the leading groups that opposed earmarks, said the group's vice president, Steve Ellis.

In fiscal year 2010, Ellis said, there were roughly 9,000 officially disclosed earmarks and another 500 suspected earmarks that were not disclosed, his group's analysis found. The moratorium has eliminated all earmarks in the first category -- those that are officially disclosed, he said. There may be some hidden earmarks escaping notice, Ellis said, but congressional leaders "are holding themselves to their standard, so we're okay with it."

There has been some speculation that lawmakers could revive earmarks to one extent or another in the next Congress, but if that were to happen, it would occur after Obama has left office. So we won't consider that possibility here.

It's worth noting that lawmakers, rather than Obama, were the primary drivers of the policy change. Still, Obama was an advocate for getting rid of earmarks, and it was enacted on his watch. So we rate it a Promise Kept.