Charlie Kirk and White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt spoke on Thursday, where the two discussed President Trump’s so-far-successful plan to dramatically cut foreign aid through a freeze on USAID funding.
Leavitt explained that USAID had become a federal agency run by "radical left lunatics” who, in her view, prioritized unnecessary programs overseas rather than advancing America’s national interests.
"Unfortunately, USAID has become a US federal agency funded by the taxpayers, but run by, as the president said, radical left lunatics who have been spending money on needless, insane priorities overseas that do nothing to advance America's interests abroad. And so this administration has streamlined USAID into the Department of State, and we have a freeze on foreign aid—the president issued that with an executive order.
"Now, Secretary [Marco] Rubio is overseeing USAID. His team at the State Department is going line by line to oversee and review some of the wasteful spending, the fraud and the abuse throughout the entire State Department, but particularly at USAID. The State Department and our DOGE team at the White House have found just egregious violations of the American taxpeople’s money. You have millions of dollars going out the door for LGBTQ programs in foreign countries. That does nothing, again, to advance our national security interests here at home, nothing to advance humanitarian causes abroad.
"This administration is going to run the federal government like a business, and business owners across the country have to go line by line, money in, money out, examining their priorities. That’s what this administration is doing," she continued, citing a Reuters poll that revealed 56 percent of Americans support the president’s freeze on foreign aid.
"The Democrats who are hooting and hollering all over Washington, DC about this are just proving they learned nothing in the last election. They continue to be incredibly out of touch with where the American people are on these very important issues. The president is not phased by the outrage by the left, which is, again, incredibly misplaced. Where was the outrage from Democrats for North Carolinians and people in California who lost everything because of natural disasters and received nothing in return from the previous administration?"
"This president and this administration are focused on putting the American people first, and if Democrats don’t understand that, I guess they should buckle up to continue to lose elections in the future
This conversation comes as the US Agency for International Development is undergoing significant changes. USAID merged under the State Department’s oversight, with Secretary Marco Rubio serving as its acting administrator. Rubio, known for his frustration with the agency during his time in Congress, has been tasked with cleaning up the agency’s operations. He previously criticized USAID for not aligning with U.S. national interests and for functioning "as a global charity separate from the national interests."
