You've all been taken for a ride and that's what happens when you get all your news from right-wing social media, which is nothing more than an outrage factory. We already know the claims about 50 million for condoms to Gaza and Politico are false as are the majority of them.
“$70,000 for production of a ‘DEI musical’ in Ireland”
This is wrong. This was a
State Department grant, not USAID. In 2022, the U.S. ambassador
hosted an event featuring Grammy-winning folk duo Francesco Turrisi and Rhiannon Giddens, along with other Irish and American musicians.
“$2.5 million for electric vehicles for Vietnam”
This is wrong. This was for more than electric vehicles. USAID launched
a $2.5 million fund that provided awards up to $100,000 to organizations with promising new products, business models, or financing models in Danang or Ho Chi Minh cities. The fund was part of a
larger effort to bring green energy to a country that is one of the world’s fastest-growing per capita greenhouse gas emitters. China has a head start on green energy, but the United States has sought to keep Vietnam out of China’s orbit, so the program was intended to boost the U.S. brand in green energy.
“$47,000 for a ‘transgender opera’ in Colombia”
This is wrong. USAID did not fund this. The White House appears to be referring to a
$25,000 State Department grant to Universidad De Los Andes in Bogotá to stage an opera, “As One,” composed by Laura Kaminsky, an American. The rest of the money came from other sources, according to Juana Monsalve, the lead actress in the Colombian performances. “This is a well-known opera in the U.S., highly acclaimed by audiences,”
Monsalve told a radio show in Spanish. “The last thing I expected was to hear those statements from the White House.”
“$6 million to fund tourism in Egypt”
This is wrong. This initiative was launched in the first Trump administration to “increase educational opportunities and strengthen the livelihoods of the people of North Sinai,”
according to the citation provided by the White House. The money would “provide access to transportation for rural communities and economic livelihood programming for families.” There is no mention of funding tourism.
“Millions to EcoHealth Alliance — which was involved in research at the Wuhan lab”
This lacks context. Before the pandemic, up until 2019, USAID provided $1.1 million to
EcoHealth Alliance, an environmental health nonprofit, via a subagreement on virus research. USAID initially awarded a grant to the University of California at Davis to improve monitoring of zoonotic viruses with pandemic potential in African and Asian countries. UC-Davis then hired EcoHealth, which in turn contracted with Wuhan University and the Wuhan Institute of Virology, to collect biological samples from roughly 1,500 individuals in the Yunnan province with exposure to bats, other wildlife and domestic animals,
according to the Government Accountability Office. The origin of the covid virus has still not been determined. In 2022, USAID awarded EcoHealth $4.7 million for a conservation project to improve farming practices in southwest Liberia — completely unrelated to virus research.
“Hundreds of thousands of dollars for a nonprofit linked to designated terrorist organizations — even AFTER an inspector general launched an investigation”
This is dubious. Allegations of links to Pakistani terror groups have never been proved and have been
denied as “baseless and defamatory” by the organization, known as Helping Hand for Relief and Development. Some GOP members of Congress for years have claimed the group has terrorism links, and the Washington Examiner
reported last year that the USAID inspector general began an investigation. The State Department, in
a brochure on American Muslims published during the first Trump administration, said Helping Hand was “lauded for its ability to deliver effective aid.”
“Funding to print ‘personalized’ contraceptives birth control devices in developing countries”
This is misleading. USAID gave
a grant to the University of Texas at Austin to develop personalized 3D-printed nonhormonal intrauterine devices (IUDs). The grant was part of a program managed by Eastern Virginia Medical School at Old Dominion University and USAID to improve reproductive health by researching low-cost, safe and noninvasive HIV prevention methods as well as contraceptives.
Hundreds of millions of dollars to fund ‘irrigation canals, farming equipment, and even fertilizer used to support the
unprecedented poppy cultivation and heroin production in Afghanistan,’ benefiting the Taliban”
This is false. USAID never intended to support opium poppy cultivation or the Taliban, and in fact the United States sought to stem it. The White House cites a right-wing news site’s account of
a 2018 report by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) — whom President
Donald Trump recently fired — that found that USAID efforts to fund alternative development projects during the George W. Bush administration (2005 to 2008) had failed. The Taliban before 2001 had successfully banned poppy cultivation, but the U.S. invasion led to a power vacuum that was exploited by poppy growers. USAID was the lead U.S. agency for implementing alternative development projects, modeled after a more successful effort in Colombia, but the report documented how conflicts among agencies and with allies hampered the effort. It’s a stretch to now, years later, accuse USAID of helping the Taliban.
False claims about the United States Agency for International Development’s spending have gone viral on social media, frequently boosted by Department of Government Efficiency leader Elon Musk.
www.forbes.com
False and misleading social media posts are circulating online as the Trump administration moves to dismantle the U.S. Agency for International Development.
apnews.com
Musk drove fringe viewpoints on USAID into the mainstream on X as the Trump administration halted the humanitarian relief agency’s work.
www.nbcnews.com