Besides being monstrously cruel and immoral, Killing U.S.A.I.D. Is a Win for Autocrats Everywhere, writes Ambassador Samantha Power:
We are witnessing one of the worst and most costly foreign policy blunders in U.S. history. Less than three weeks into Donald Trump’s second term, he, Elon Musk and Secretary of State Marco Rubio have halted the U.S. Agency for International Development’s aid programs around the world. In so doing, they have imperiled millions of lives, thousands of American jobs and billions of dollars of investment in American small businesses and farms while severely undermining our national security and global influence — all while authoritarians and extremists celebrate their luck.
Many of the agency’s most significant investments — like helping communities rebuild after ISIS has been defeated or improving poor countries’ ability to suppress deadly infectious disease outbreaks — are immensely important for national security. And yet U.S.A.I.D. is no longer monitoring bird flu in 49 countries as it was three weeks ago; it has stopped working with at-risk youth in Central America to prevent gang violence that spurs migration; it is not cleaning up fields poisoned by Agent Orange in Vietnam; it is not eradicating polio; it is not collaborating with communities in countries like Syria, Morocco and Kazakhstan to reduce vulnerability to radicalization. The costs of dismantling these programs — and thus perpetrating these harms — will be felt for generations to come.
Some investments save lives almost immediately — like the medicines dispensed to 500,000 children with H.I.V., or the nutrient-rich food manufactured in states like Rhode Island and Georgia that pulls starving children from the brink of death.
U.S.A.I.D. has generated vast stores of political capital in the more than 100 countries where it works.
Unless [the Administration’s] cruel and immensely counterproductive actions are reversed — or Republicans in Congress join Democrats in an effort to roll them back — future generations will marvel that it wasn’t China’s actions that eroded U.S. standing and global security, paving the way for Beijing to become the partner of choice around the world. Instead, it was an American president and the billionaire he unleashed to shoot first and aim later, eliminating an institution that is a cost-effective example of what once distinguished the United States from our adversaries.
I’d urge you to read Power’s full piece — every word of it, authoritative and compelling.
And to join one of Indivisible‘s 1,300 chapters to fight back.
And . . . if you have a few more minutes . . . to watch Lawrence O’Donnell, starting here, with inflation; or here, with the CEO of the Ford Motor Company; or here to see how Americans feel about the January 6 pardons and renaming the Gulf of Mexico . . . but especially about “Elon Musk’s literally snatching food away from starving babies.”
O’Donnell may not have been fair in citing $57,000 as the sole dubious expenditure Musk found to justify his actions. But it was the sole example cited by the White House Press Secretary; and even if they had come up with $1 billion in dubious outlays — what about the other 97.5% of U.S.A.I.D.’s budget?
I have not read 2 Corinthians, but can Christian MAGAs abide starving the poor to fund tax cuts for the rich?
Even if they can, “we are witnessing one of the worst and most costly foreign policy blunders in U.S. history.”
Surely MAGA voters didn’t vote for that.
They have been betrayed.