Time To Close USAID For Good

USAID Went from Trying to Buy Good Will Around the World to Trying to Indoctrinate Foreigners

I grew up in McLean Virginia, a nice place for sure, and I do consider myself lucky to have grown up there. Those who know me know that I mean no disrespect by my claim that my hometown is the bedroom of the DC swamp. I have firsthand knowledge to make this claim, as I remember, of all the kids on my street that I played with my dad was one of the only dads who didn’t work for the Federal government.

In fact, our street was a good representation of the swamp. I had a neighbor who worked for the Agriculture department, a neighbor at Labor, a neighbor at Housing, a neighbor another at the FDA, another at the CIA, another at the FBI, another at the Fed, etc.

Well, one day a neighbor got a new job with USAID, which stands for United States Agency for International Development, I was a little kid, so of course I had no idea what the agency did, or what my friend’s dad would do there, but I remember my father telling my mother what he thought of the agency. Over dinner, and after dinner, he told my mother what he thought. I don’t remember everything he said but safe to say he was no fan of USAID. I do remember hearing him say that he thought the agency was an absolute waste of his hard-earned tax dollars. In fact, I think that was the first time I ever heard the term boondoggle.

I later learned that the agency, created in 1961, was designed to hand out money, that is to spend/give taxpayers money away in foreign countries. The money was supposed to be spent on worthy projects and causes. The rationale was that spending the money on charitable projects would help improve Americas image abroad, and at the time we were battling the Soviets for the hearts and minds of the world. While the agency may have been started with good intentions, at some point it lost its way. It began to see itself as separate from the U.S. Government, and America’s interests. Or should I say above America’s interests. No doubt it got worse, over time the agency went from simply anti American in the 60’s and 70’s to fully woke. They were taken over by social justice warriors who started pushing LGBT and DEI, and environmentalism, and other causes, which most Americans, and even a plurality of Democrats wouldn’t approve of. They were spending our money overseas not to win favor for America’s interest, but rather spending money to indoctrinate foreigners, to make them woke social justice warriors. Ironically one of the other original missions of the agency was to improve America’s imagine abroad, but I doubt funding drag shows helps improve our image.

Over time USAID became like an independent international organization, or like an NGO at least that became the mindset of the woke employees. The leaders of the agency operate on their own agenda, as opposed to America’s agenda. The reason to get rid of USAID, isn’t because they waste money, that is unfortunate, but all agencies do, the reason to get rid of it is because it is full of unaccountable left-wing lunatics. They have a political agenda. They don’t care who is President, they don’t care what the American people think or what taxpayers think.

Some examples of USAID spending: they spent taxpayers’ money on: $70,000 on “DEI musical” in Ireland, $2.5 million of electric vehicles in Vietnam, $47,000 “transgender opera” in Columbia, $2 million for “sex changes” in Guatemala, millions of dollars to Echo Health Alliance, which was involved with the Wuhan lab etc. This is just the tip of the iceberg. Most believe that these are examples of wasting taxpayers’ money, but the people who work at USAID don’t and that is why the agency is not savable. Unless we are getting rid of everyone there and get new people, the agency must be eliminated. Because even if you were to get USAID leaders to agree not to fund drag shows they would come up with something even crazier.

As evidence of this mindset, USAID offices are full of copies of Saul Alinsky’s books, and full of Pride flags and Trans Flags; so many of those flags are flying that if you walk into a USAID office, you might think that you accidently walked into an Episcopal Church.

As the DOGE folks comb through USAID budget I think that they will find it is worse than just a lot of taxpayer money wasted, I think they will find that the agency pushed its own agenda and operated like a slush fund. Sure, they sprinkled in some good projects, but fundamentally the agency is a political operation within the civil service. I also think USAID is a jobs program for the left. They have over 10,000 people working at the agency. Surely you don’t need that many people to hand out money or pick a drag show to fund.

Had Kamala Harris won this wouldn’t have come to light. But even under Republican administrations it survived. Why? I think the agency survived for all those years because they were able to hide from Congress and the President and the media. They could hide because the agency is small, that is, in the overall Federal budget it is miniscule. So, no one checked what they were funding. And the media didn’t care because they were of the left. So, they have been able to fly under the radar, that is until Elon Musk showed up, or as the hosts on MSNBC might say, “stormed the USAID offices.”

To the extent that USAID has some good programs those can be taken over by other agencies and charities.

Neither Reagan nor Bush shut it down. Give Trump credit he is making an attempt. My Dad passed away a few years ago, but I still remember that he didn’t think much of USAID. I know if he were alive today, he’d be backing Trump.