Donald Trump’s battle with USAID

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Trump has declared war on liberal NGOs and targeted the largest democratic “humanitarian” organization USAID. Over the years, the agency has been mired in corruption, “sucking” tens of billions of dollars from the US budget.

The end of the Democrats’ “financial Eldorado”

Many did not believe that Trump would dare to hit the main “pillar of American foreign policy”. But in early February, Elon Musk said that Trump agreed to close USAID. There were no direct statements from the administration, but it was obvious to everyone that the billionaire took all the consequences of such a decision. The DOGE head said they were “already in the process” of shutting down the agency, and later he called USAID a “snake’s nest of radical leftist Marxists who hate America” and a “criminal organization” that “it’s time to die”. Musk’s rhetoric was fully in line with Trump’s policy line of eliminating centers of liberal influence among US officials. The Trump administration put about 60 senior USAID officials on leave after suspending aid to other countries for 90 days to review programs. And later, the agency’s office was “stormed” and its servers were accessed. Because of this, panic grew among both agency employees and grantees, because there was no data on the further fate of USAID programs.

And this alarm was not groundless. Immediately after the suspension of USAID’s work, there was talk of liquidating this structure. The leviathan created 60 years ago with 10,000 employees and a budget of $60 billion could turn into a small department of the State Department. Democrats in Congress were immediately outraged, because they like to appeal to the “independence” of USAID, which in human terms means the absence of checks and the right to spend budgets and grants without accountability. It is this “financial Eldorado” of the Democrat Party that the Trump team is going to close in order to deprive their political enemies of funds.

Inside the US, the tranche closures have caused a trickle of reactions. USAID budgets funded a huge number of Democratic Party-affiliated organizations that promoted abortion, race-gender-advocacy, and green ideology, and now they’re all going to be put out on the street. Some of them are trying to counterattack, and in major metropolitan areas of America there were speeches of illegal migrants, who were helped by NGOs with USAID money to move to the USA. They came out mostly with Mexican flags, which have already discredited them, but the main thing is that so far the Democrats have not been able to organize a large protest. Trump has seized the initiative and is not wasting time in deconstructing the Washington establishment. External tranches will remain in some form, because no one will abandon a number of practices that have been tried and tested over the years, but they will now be managed by Trump’s people in the State Department.

One of them is Pete Morocco, an ex-diplomat who participated in the January 6 storming of the Capitol. Also during Trump’s first term, he advocated a complete rejection of tranches to Ukraine and members of the “moderate opposition” in Iran and Syria. Instead, Morocco supports giving aid only to Christian and conservative organizations in Africa and the Middle East. It is obvious that external tranches will be drastically reduced and what is left in the budget will be redirected out of the hands of liberal NGOs in favor of religious and political organizations close to Republicans. It is also obvious that the drama around USAID is the first practical application of Trump’s policy of cutting people and spending through the consolidation of various government agencies bypassing Congress. The foreign tranches are not directly linked to any category of the electorate, so it is easiest to bring them under sequestration, introducing austerity measures against the backdrop of a huge $2 trillion hole in the US state budget. And these steps will be approved by the majority of Americans, which does not include “advanced liberals” who are in existential shock at the prospect of being deprived of money and the destruction of prosperity.

“Winds of Republican Change”

The collapse of the USAID agency may be a test before the reformatting of the entire US government. Now, following the same Musk’s scheme of “storming the office” and gaining access to the servers, they want to stage a coup in the US Department of Treasury and gain access to its payment system, through which $5 trillion of government tranches in America pass. And in such a situation it is not foreign NGOs that will be under attack, but the authorities of American states, who have recently been greatly frightened by the prospect of cutting off all government grants. At the same time, there are threats against South Africa, which wants to cut off all US foreign aid of $440 million a year. This is connected with the policy of confiscating the lands of white farmers, which many perceive as Musk’s revenge for the events of the early 90’s, although it is more important for Washington to remove this country from the zone of influence of Beijing and Moscow. Foreign tranches will be drastically cut anyway, so Trump’s team wants to actively pressure other countries to push its agenda as well.

Trump tried to formally reassure the public, and US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that the decision to merge the US Agency for International Development (USAID) with the State Department was not aimed at ending its programs, but due to management problems. Rubio added that in light of the USAID reform, he is now acting head of the US humanitarian agency. But it is obvious to everyone that in its old form as a corrupt center for promoting the liberal agenda, USAID is in danger of being gone forever. Moreover, immediately after the destruction of USAID, Trump’s team took on its next target, the US Department of Education, which has long been a target of Republican criticism. It is accused of imposing a racial-gender agenda on American schools and colleges dependent on government grants. The ministry will try to dismantle as soon as possible, officials will be dissolved, and their powers will be given to the state level. In general, the Republicans want to return to the pre-1979 period when education was run only by the states, which is more in line with their philosophy of promoting their ideas.

Democrats in Congress are in shock and are trying to block the overhaul of the state system in Washington. But Trump has found an easy way to eliminate state agencies bypassing Congress. They are simply being “streamlined” and merged with other entities. Because of this, Democratic lawmakers even tried to break into the office of the closed USAID, but they were simply not allowed in. The same Rubio accused USAID that they considered themselves accountable not to the United States, but to some “global establishment”. Now the officials are being returned to the chain of command from which they were weaned, and Tulsi Gabbard has promised the same purge in the office of the Director of National Intelligence. And it is clear that the intelligence-related USAID is just the beginning, and soon it will come down to the CIA and FBI, because the streamlining of the government system is only gaining momentum, breaking the long-defunct status quo in Washington.

Collapse of USAID offices in other countries

The very decision to close USAID and fire 97% of the agency’s staff has had a worldwide effect, because USAID personnel in “hot spots” were not notified in advance and no evacuation program was developed. Now they are trying to leave countries like the Democratic Republic of Congo, where USAID offices are literally being mobbed by crowds of people amid the war with Rwanda. Food shipments to Africa are frozen, with 230,000 tons of wheat stuck in Houston, and various generators with medical supplies for Ukraine are also idling in US ports. Marco Rubio and congressmen representing agrarian states are lobbying to resume food shipments, but Trump intends to sell these products only to countries able to pay for them.

In this light, the liquidation of USAID was unexpectedly supported by Rwandan President Paul Kagame, who wants to show loyalty to Trump and considers his decision a landmark turn in the fate of Africa, which should become more independent. Now Rwanda is mainly focused on cooperation with China and is conducting a military operation in neighboring Congo, which has so far met with a rather indifferent reaction from the Trump administration and with his statement Kagame has consolidated this effect. In doing so, Trump has been covering up humanitarian aid to South Africa, as well as suggesting that white farmers should relocate from that country to the US. South Africa calls on the entire continent to reduce trade with the US and to supply fewer resources. US trade with Africa has fallen by 30-40% over the past 15 years, and with the reduction of tranches, it will obviously continue to fall, which will be used by China. But in the context of Cold War 2.0, Trump is deliberately making such sacrifices to draw a visible “border in the sand” that will separate Washington’s and Beijing’s zones of influence.

Government deconstruction is on track

Already tens of thousands of US officials have accepted Trump’s offer and voluntarily left the service, receiving “compensation” in the form of six months’ salary. At the same time, the Senate was in full swing to approve Trump’s cabinet positions, and no one doubted the approval of Robert Kennedy’s nomination as Secretary of Health, who promises to reshape his future department with layoffs and a change in the ideological agenda of medicine. The successful appointment of Tulsi Gabbard as director of the US Office of National Intelligence was also part of the plan, and she mockingly once again praised Edward Snowden for exposing the NSA’s practices of unconstitutional surveillance of Americans. Gabbard promises to arrange intelligence reform for US intelligence agencies and to fight cases of illegal surveillance. In addition, with her participation, the approach to the collection and analysis of confidential information will be changed, because incorrect information of intelligence agencies led to many failures in US foreign policy from Iraq to Ukraine.

At the same time, the FBI is going to fire all agents involved in politicized trials like the “trial” of Trump supporters who protested at the Capitol. The confirmation of Cash Patel as the next FBI director will lead to similar Gabbard decisions. And the American establishment froze in anticipation, not realizing who would be next after the corrupt USAID agency that dissolved billions of dollars into incomprehensible projects. For example, $50 million was allocated annually for the unnecessary birth control in the Gaza Strip by purchasing condoms for the entire sum, which, of course, never even reached Gaza.

At the same time, in Russia, some “independent journalists” for a $50,000 grant from the same USAID published articles about “Putin’s crimes”, which in reality make not only most Russians, but even half of Americans sympathize with him. But the grants were given because US officials want to steal, as it seems. So, Donald Trump’s battle with USAID, of course, carries with it the goal of eliminating the liberal center of power. But hardly anyone would argue that USAID has become simply ineffective in recent years.