Rep. Matt Gaetz (FL-01) introduced legislation Tuesday that would abolish the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).
Gaetz says USAID is pushing a radical, leftist ideology abroad instead of engaging in diplomacy and creating international relations consistent with American values.
The legislation is co-sponsored by Reps. Andy Biggs (AZ-05), Eli Crane (AZ-02), Paul Gosar (AZ-09), Marjorie Taylor Greene (GA-14), and Anna Paulina Luna (FL-13).
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“American taxpayer dollars are being wasted to fund radical leftist propaganda in foreign countries. The American people will not tolerate government-funded degeneracy at home, and we certainly will not accept its force-feeding abroad under Old Glory,” said Gaetz.
“USAID does not serve a meaningful purpose. It is used as a slush fund for international wokeism. Therefore, serious lawmakers in Congress should support its complete abolition,” Gaetz said.
A Heritage Foundation report from May 10th, 2022, found that USAID was using American taxpayer dollars to weaponize foreign aid programs and export radical, leftist ideology worldwide.
Among these programs were those supporting abortion, gender equity programs, and climate alarmism. The legislation will make no federal funds available for USAID to further carry out any functions, duties, or responsibilities assigned or delegated to the agency.
In January, readers of Tampa Free Press may recall when we reported that Republican Rep. Mike McCaul alleged that USAID funded a nonprofit group with links to terrorists.
The amount of money was a pittance by Washington’s standards — just $110,000.
But McCaul, a Texas Republican who leads the House Foreign Affairs Committee, argued it’s the principle of giving money to enemies of the West.
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According to a letter McCaul sent to USAID Administrator Samantha Power, the congressman asserted “credible” and “longstanding, detailed allegations” that the nonprofit group Helping Hand for Relief and Development, or HHRD, which is “connected to designated terrorist organizations, terror financiers, and extremist groups.”
It’s unclear what the funding went for. But McCaul noted that he was forced to go public because USAID had ignored his requests for detailed information since last May.
When USAID finally briefed McCaul’s committee on Jan. 11, “it was clear that the agency had failed to take any action to investigate the allegations or suspend the award, despite having been provided detailed information by congressional staff months prior.”
“Shockingly,” he added, “one of the subject-matter experts in the briefing acknowledged that he had only been made aware of the matter the week before.”
USAID, the congressman wrote, utterly failed in “its clear responsibility to promptly examine the allegations and to determine if it has been providing taxpayer dollars to an entity linked to designated terrorist organizations.”
“USAID’s gross negligence in handling this matter and its alarming failure to take the allegations seriously are simply unacceptable,” McCaul added.
In January 2023 alone, issued a new guide to teachers going overseas that directed them to help “promote gender fluidity and sexual orientation ideology in the classroom” and to “ensure that education officials do not reveal a student’s sexual orientation or gender identity without the student’s permission,” not even to the student’s parents.
USAID also funded India with $30 million in taxpayers’ dollars to help India reduce its plastic pollution, even though India’s economy, although much smaller than America’s, will still grow six times as fast as the U.S. economy this year.
Gaetz’s legislation, if passed, will also rescind the unobligated funds made available for the agency and transfer all other assets or liabilities to the Secretary of State.
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