LIBBY EMMONS: No more trans comic books in Peru—so long to USAID

The 2025 USAID request from the Biden administration was a budget of $42.8 billion.

The 2025 USAID request from the Biden administration was a budget of $42.8 billion.

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Elon Musk has his DOGE boys in the White House culling through US funding across the world and what they've discovered, what many of us already knew, is that USAID, which is the nice way of saying United States Agency for International Development, has been spending our money far and wide on useless extravagances across the world. There are the trans comic books in Peru (gone), spending on drag shows in Ecuador (sayonara), programs to support atheism in Nepal (nyet!), all of which were funded by a government checkbook that was primarily intended to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, and shelter the homeless. 

President JFK created USAID in 1961 to be the humanitarian arm of the US government. It was supposed to help curb diseases, respond to famines and natural disasters, aid with poverty relief. But over the years, like anything that survives far past the lifetime of the founders, it has become bloated and wasteful and has been used to do things like advocate for abortion in Rwanda, LGBTQIA+ initiatives in Hungary, and mitigate climate change. The Post Millennial covered this in 2023 when we discovered that Samantha Power, who had been the US Ambassador to the UN and is the now the former USAID administrator, traveled to Hungary to bolster the LGBTQIA+ community there after the government put forth policies of conservatism and spoke out against Biden's comments on Putin. In other words, the US government used USAID humanitarian funds in an attempt to destabilize Hungary's government by funding their domestic detractors in activism and media. I don't think that's what JFK had in mind—at least, I hope it isn't.

The 2025 USAID request from the Biden administration was a budget of $42.8 billion. The page is down, so you have to go digging to find it, but the internet is forever. That massive expenditure included money for Ukraine, foreign aid in the Indo-Pacific, and "continued investments to address the world's most pressing issues—the climate crisis, food insecurity, threats to democracy, global health security, and the need to increase the adoption of open and secure digital technologies globally. It also responds to humanitarian crises worldwide, includes funding to address the challenge of irregular migration, and spurs economic growth and combats the PRC's coercing lending through the Partnership for Global Infrastructure and Investment." 



The budgetary outlay would send funds to Sudan, Afghanistan (where women aren't allowed to speak in public or be seen through the windows of their own homes), Haiti (run entirely by gangs), and the Middle East (many nations of which are backing the destruction of our closest ally in the region), and natural disasters. It seems like Trump did way more for all these initiatives with a lot less. It takes very little money to spout off on social media and make declarations only to watch your adversaries and allies alike scramble to set things straight. Venezuela and Colombia are both taking their people back after some initial grandstanding. Canada and Mexico are working with Trump on border security after tariff threats. Migrants are not coming or are returning home of their own accord, all without $42.8 billion to "address the challenge of irregular migration." And let's not forget that Kamala Harris, during her brief and pointless stint as border czar, said that a root cause of migration was violence against LGBTQIA+ people in their home countries. That's why that administration prioritized asylum for gay and trans migrants.

60 top staffers were told to stay home from work on Monday. The offices were essentially closed. Trump folded USAID into the State Department and Marco Rubio is now in charge. But Democrats all staged a protest outside the offices anyway, speaking about how much USAID does globally and how it's authoritarian to remove the program and the funding. And I get that, to a certain extent, I think Americans want to help the world, but they don't want to fund trans comic books in Peru, or abortions, or new media in Hungary with the sole purpose of destabilizing the government there. 

I think instead we Americans want to feed the hungry, heal the sick, and help people who need it. Humanitarian aid should not come with a political message, instead it should be used to help, not to cajole, to care, not to coerce. And it hasn't been allocated according to those principles over the past who-knows-how-many-decades. I don't know about you, but it's pretty infuriating to get your paycheck, see all the federal taxes taken out, and then hear from the likes of Chuck Schumer, Jamie Raskin, and Ilhan Omar about how the money should be spent on their pet projects overseas. Are there good programs being funded? I'm sure. Do they outweigh the boondoggles and improvidence? I doubt it.

Schumer complained that pulling these programs, which implement American values overseas as defined by Democrats, Biden and Obama, will interrupt American influence in Africa, Asia, and other far-flung locales. He said that "Our humanitarian efforts are critical for fighting Ebola, which is spreading in Uganda right now. It’s essential for countering terrorist activity." But how does furthering LGBTQIA+ propaganda globally help fight terror? He went on to say, in his protest against Trump, DOGE, and the pulling of these funds that "If America retreats from the rest of the world, China will fill in the void. Russia’s influence will grow. Hatred against the U.S. will keep rising. Our diplomatic influence will disintegrate." Hasn't all that been happening anyway? We've been spending all this money yet the worst case scenario Schumer imagines is actually already upon us.

Ilhan Omar spoke about her childhood in Somalia, growing up in a refugee camp funded by USAID, eating food provided by America, both good things that America has done. Yet she came to America and became a congresswoman from Minnesota only to continuously speak out against America both in domestic concerns and globally. She supports terrorism, as evidenced by her backing of the pro-Hamas activists who took over buildings and issued threats to Jewish students on the campus of Columbia University. She actively opposes US strength despite having grown up being aided by the very programs that Schumer says will decrease terrorism. 

Jamie Raskin had the unmitigated gall to claim that USAID programs aren't even that much money, which is exactly what CBS' Margaret Brennan (of "I don't really care, Margaret" fame) said to Rep. Brian Mast when he pointed out the waste on live TV. "This is about termination and obliteration of the major foreign aid programs of the United States of America, all of which together total less than $40 billion," Raskin said before comparing it to our defense budget. "We have a Pentagon budget of $900 billion. The Pentagon budget is where the defense contractor Elon Musk, who became the richest man in the world off of our money, collects his payments from. And now he’s trying to shut down USAID." So sure, is there a conflict of interest with Elon Musk mucking around in the government kitty? Undoubtedly. Does that mean we should be funding trans operas in Colombia? No, it doesn't. Also, whose $40 billion is that? It's not Raskin's, it's not Schumer's, it's not Omar's, it's not Somalia's or Kenya's or Hungary's, it's not Ukraine's or Indonesia's or Peru's, oh no. It's ours, it's entirely ours.

I have two words for those lawmakers and their sticky fingers for our hard-earned cash, and a whole lot of anger. If we're funding trans comic books in Peru, trans operas in Colombia, LGBTQIA+ initiatives in Hungary, anything at all in Afghanistan, I want my money back and I don't want to see one more tax bill until those programs are wiped out. The government doesn't need more money, it needs better priorities.
 

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