Fear, pain and hunger: The dire impact of shutting down USAID in Africa, leaving a vacuum for China and Russia

[essentialsaltes]

2 million dollars on Guatemalan transgender surgeries and condoms for the terrorists.

False.

The White House’s wildly inaccurate claims about USAID spending​

Eleven out of 12 claims about the agency’s work are misleading, wrong or lack context.

Titled “At USAID, Waste and Abuse Runs Deep,” the news release claimed USAID “has been unaccountable to taxpayers as it funnels massive sums of money to the ridiculous — and, in many cases, malicious — pet projects of entrenched bureaucrats, with next-to-no oversight.”

The news release then listed 12 examples, plucked from the websites of right-wing media. But the numbers cited — as low as $32,000 — hardly justify the claim that these are “massive sums” of money. In fact, they are so low that some of the funds appear to have been awarded at the ambassador level, without Washington involvement. At least one dated from the first Trump administration, and some were actually State Department grants, not USAID.

“$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.

“$47,000 for a ‘transgender opera’ in Colombia”
This is wrong. USAID did not fund this.

“$32,000 for a ‘transgender comic book’ in Peru”
This is wrong. USAID did not fund this

There's nothing more to say. Your outcry is farcical,

Your facts are alternative. Your outrage is misguided.

 

[Bradskii]

2 million dollars on Guatemalan transgender surgeries and condoms for the terrorists.

There's nothing more to say.

There certainly is. The money is going to help a clinic in Guatemala which helps trans women as well as the general population. From here: A beacon of hope in Guatemala

'In Guatemala, transgender women still face exclusion, discrimination, stigma, verbal and physical violence, criminalization, marginalization and a lack of recognition of their rights, resulting in a life expectancy of only 35 to 40 years old. The average life expectancy in the country is 74 years old.'

Maybe you've got a list of people and things that you believe aid shouldn't be spent on. Gay people, or trans perhaps. Abortion care maybe. Well, tough luck. Aid doesn't discriminate. It goes to those that need it.

And condoms for terrorists? Beats me why you aren't linking to these claims. Possibly because people are lying to you (it seems to happen a lot these days). From here: No Evidence US Govt Allocated $50M To Send Condoms to Gaza

Per the White House transcript, Leavitt said: "[The Department of Government Efficiency] DOGE and [the Office of Management and Budget] OMB also found that there was about to be 50 million taxpayer dollars that went out the door to fund condoms in Gaza. That is a preposterous waste of taxpayer money."

Leavitt offered no evidence to back up her claim. We looked through documents detailing funds spent on contraceptives and family planning initiatives by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and found no evidence that tens of millions of dollars were earmarked for condoms in Gaza. We regard the claim as unproven.

 

[essentialsaltes]

We looked through documents detailing funds spent on contraceptives and family planning initiatives by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and found no evidence that tens of millions of dollars were earmarked for condoms in Gaza. We regard the claim as unproven.

There is some supposition that the reference is to a province in Mozambique called Gaza.

 

[Pommer]

There is some supposition that the reference is to a province in Mozambique called Gaza.

Who can keep up with all of the geography changes?
Honest mistake.

 

[iluvatar5150]

Who can keep up with all of the geography changes?
Honest mistake.

In elementary school, there was a world map on the wall next to my desk that I would stare at and memorize whenever I got bored, which was all the time. I eventually knew every country.

Then the Soviet Union fell and ruined everything.

 

[Hazelelponi]

Then the Soviet Union fell and ruined everything.

And it's spirit is falling once again. Thanks and praise be to God.

 

[RileyG]

Since Islamism is taking over, the wealthy Muslim countries can pick up the slack, and help their own.

Islamism has helped no one and not one country. Look at the oppression of women!

 

[Hazelelponi]

What place are you talking about? I was on a training gig in Tunisia funded by the Stare Department just before Thanksgiving. Tunisia is a Muslim county where the government is pro-western and rigorously anti-terrorist. I've also spent USAID money in officially Christian countries--including Uganda, where gays are subject to summary execution. Is that "pro-western" enough for you?

Tunis is where the Arab spring began and is chock full of radicals.

It's a hotbed for al-Qaeda same as any other Islamic nation. al-Qaeda got their start right next door to Tunis.

If the state department thinks Tunis is some great spot of sanity they are in for a surprise... Not that they bother looking, because they don't want to actually know anything besides 'can I control this new puppet we got installed'.

Hopefully that's going well for them... But I'm grateful for new leadership at State. Maybe we will support fewer radicals, and perhaps spend fewer dollars sending left-wingers to Islamic nations for the weekend so they can pretend they know something about Islam. It's always telling.

As a besides, our Republic? The way it's set up works perfectly for Christians, Christians had a huge hand in creating it so we could have a place where the government and our faith were not at odds.

Islam the religion does not fit into this model of government. Your always going to have problems when the government system isn't within the faith system. Islam is not just another Abrahamic faith, it's a faith system opposed to ours - the Christians and the Jews and the secularists all.

You put ignorant people at risk when you tell people otherwise.

 

[essentialsaltes]

Tunis is where the Arab spring began and is chock full of radicals.

It's a hotbed for al-Qaeda same as any other Islamic nation.

After the revolution, terrorists attacked the Bardo Museum as an attack on the European tourists and the stability of the new-ish government. The government came out strongly against terrorism, and so did the people.

Anti-terrorism protests began in central Tunis after the attack, with crowds reportedly chanting, "Tunisia is free, terrorism out."[28] On 24 March, nearly a week after the attack, the museum held a ceremonial reopening. Simultaneously, thousands of Tunisians and tourists staged a march in Tunis to show their solidarity with the slain victims.

 

[Bradskii]

Christians had a huge hand in creating it so we could have a place where the government and our faith were not at odds.

It's your various interpretation of your faith that are at odds with each other. If there was one denomination that had universal agreement on all the matters that were important, then maybe you'd have a point. There isn't. So you don't. Christian Nationalism is a step towards a theocracy.

 

[essentialsaltes]

“Olivia Doe” has been a USAID employee in Kinshasa since 2023. She works on establishing direct lines of critical minerals, including cobalt, from Congo to the United States.

The country is home to 60 percent of the world’s cobalt. It is extracted through an under-regulated system of about 100,000 miners, who risk their lives to dig hundreds of feet underground with hand tools. The mineral is almost exclusively sent to China, where it is used to make batteries

Olivia wrote that her job was to help reduce the country’s dependence on China through increased trade with the United States.

“We have essentially ‘ghosted’ all of our partners and our reputation may forever be tarnished as a result,” she wrote, later adding: “China is ready to immediately jump in and take over.”

 

[essentialsaltes]

Trump’s global funding freeze leaves anti-terror programs in limbo​

U.S. officials say now-suspended programs across Africa were designed specifically to respond to national security threats and contain the spread of terrorism.

But four current and former U.S. officials, who, like others interviewed for this report, spoke on the condition of anonymity because they feared government retaliation, said that many of the affected programs were specifically designed to respond to national security threats, and that their suspension could endanger America and its international allies.

Of particular concern is the Anti Terrorism Assistance program, which the United States spent $264 million on in 2023 to improve the capacity of allies to respond to extremist threats. Other programs counter transnational organized crime and narcotics and strengthen local law enforcement. Almost all are now suspended.

“This is not ‘The Apprentice.’ You can’t just tell your partners: you’re fired,” wrote one former U.S. security official. [Au contraire! This is the reality show/Fox News presidency.] “Everything we give them from training and equipment to general advice is, by definition, foreign assistance, most of which they have come to depend on to sustain operations that WE have imposed to ‘keep America safe!’”

Nearly 400 [US-trained Somali special forces] graduates were left outside an American military base with no provision for food, fuel or electricity.

Another private contractor, which conducts medevacs for wounded Somali soldiers,

U.S.-supported laboratories in Mogadishu and Garowe, Somalia, ... provided fingerprints [from bombs] and other crime scene data to Interpol and the FBI.

The [US] drones allowed Kenyan forces to discover caches of water in jerricans hidden in remote areas by al-Shabab

In the coastal nation of Benin, a historically strong democracy menaced by al-Qaeda-linked militants, a multiyear program to train the army for counterterrorism operations

 

[essentialsaltes]

After a bipartisan outcry, Rubio on Saturday announced a specific carve-out [again the administration rescinding its own actions] to enable continued funding for PEPFAR — a universally celebrated HIV/AIDS program launched by former president George W. Bush that is credited with saving millions of lives in Africa and which 20 million people still depend on. Despite the exemption, many PEPFAR initiatives have been thrown into chaos.

“I’m told that drugs are still being withheld at clinics in Africa,” Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-Louisiana) said Monday on X.

Pepfar-funded HIV organisations in South Africa, who receive their funds through the United States Agency for International Development, USAID, woke up to letters that were sent overnight telling them their grants have been ended — permanently.

 

[Bradskii]

Where are the Republicans in Congress with the cojones to say 'This must stop'?

 

[A2SG]

Where are the Republicans in Congress with the cojones to say 'This must stop'?

Probably prostrating themselves before Trump, hoping for the stuff they voted to fund to remain funded.

-- A2SG, and wondering if Elon will start to think he can fire members of congress with an email.....

 

[essentialsaltes]

Harsh findings on Trump’s aid freeze kept secret by USAID watchdog​

Two reports showing dire impacts on Africa and Gaza have not been released [even to Congress!] in fear of Trump’s wrath, official says

The watchdog for the U.S. Agency for International Development has yet to release two critical reports on the consequences of President Donald Trump’s funding freeze on crucial services in Africa and the Middle East, amid fears of retaliation from the White House, according to interviews and documents obtained by The Washington Post.

One of the unreleased reports says the cutbacks threaten the ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip

And an unpublished global audit found security dangers, risks of widespread looting and disease, and tens of millions of dollars in new costs brought about by the withdrawal of foreign aid and mass relocation of USAID staff, according to documents and interviews. Conditions are particularly dire across southern Africa, South Sudan and Senegal

The reports were both planned for release about two weeks ago, but remain in draft form in the email inboxes of acting deputy inspector general Marc Meyer — the de facto inspector general [after Trump fired the Inspector General] Trump has also fired 17 other inspectors general across the government.

The Gaza report, drafted two weeks ago, has not just been kept from the public but also from Congress, which has requested a copy because of the gravity of the findings.

“I requested this report because the American people — the entire world — needs and deserves to know what the inspector general found,” [Rep.] Connolly said. “This is exactly why we have inspectors general, and they must be free to do their jobs, respond to Congress and work on behalf of the American people without fear of retribution.”

[In addition to crippling the distribution of aid and coordination with partners...] The freezing of funds also has shut down USAID’s partner unit responsible for vetting aid distributors for ties to terrorist organizations.

In particular, USAID’s disaster assistance response team based in Jerusalem was reduced to three employees from 17, and the response management team supporting Gaza aid was down to seven employees from 20.

HIV drug distribution to 16,000 South Sudanese “who are alive because AID provides HIV treatment” was at deep risk, they said.
“If we stop, they will die,” auditors wrote.

And the withdrawal puts West Africa and the Sahel at risk for increased terrorism, illegal immigration, drug trafficking and increased Russian influence, they wrote.

[In southern Africa] China’s influence in the region, already on the rise, will only grow, auditors said.

 

[essentialsaltes]

US Terminates Thousands of Life-Saving Health Grants Including For HIV and Malaria. ALL US-made food for malnourished children cancelled.

Grants to hundreds of African HIV organisations providing life-saving services have been terminated with immediate effect via letters received on Thursday morning.

The Trump administration also announced that it was stopping US funding for the Joint UN Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) on Thursday.

“All malaria supplies protecting 53 million people, mostly children, including bed nets, diagnostics, preventive drugs, and treatments – terminated,” said Dr Atul Gawande, USAID’s former assistant administrator under the Biden administration.

Terminated too are all global tuberculosis programmes, all US-made food aid aimed at malnourished children and around 1000 food kitchens serving displaced people in Sudan.

Prof Linda-Gail Bekker, CEO of the South African Desmond Tutu HIV Foundation, said that the US termination would cost 500,000 South African lives over the next 10 years and result in around half a million new HIV infections, according to recent modelling.

Mitchell Warren, head of the US-based HIV programme AVAC, described the blanket termination of USAID grants as “unlawful”.

“This is not about PEPFAR. This is not about the HIV response. This is not about USAID. This is about the rule of law. The United States Congress has the power of the purse. They decide what gets spent. The executive branch is there to execute, and that’s the basis of this legal argument.

“But as of [Wednesday] night, they began to basically massacre every possible implementing agency to deliver on this work. This court case, as important as it is, is not going to change that overnight."

I know, I know, those pregnant moms were probably selling those antivirals on the black market to terrorists rather than protecting their fetuses.

 

[Nithavela]

US Terminates Thousands of Life-Saving Health Grants Including For HIV and Malaria. ALL US-made food for malnourished children cancelled.

Grants to hundreds of African HIV organisations providing life-saving services have been terminated with immediate effect via letters received on Thursday morning.

The Trump administration also announced that it was stopping US funding for the Joint UN Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) on Thursday.

“All malaria supplies protecting 53 million people, mostly children, including bed nets, diagnostics, preventive drugs, and treatments – terminated,” said Dr Atul Gawande, USAID’s former assistant administrator under the Biden administration.

Terminated too are all global tuberculosis programmes, all US-made food aid aimed at malnourished children and around 1000 food kitchens serving displaced people in Sudan.

Prof Linda-Gail Bekker, CEO of the South African Desmond Tutu HIV Foundation, said that the US termination would cost 500,000 South African lives over the next 10 years and result in around half a million new HIV infections, according to recent modelling.

Mitchell Warren, head of the US-based HIV programme AVAC, described the blanket termination of USAID grants as “unlawful”.

“This is not about PEPFAR. This is not about the HIV response. This is not about USAID. This is about the rule of law. The United States Congress has the power of the purse. They decide what gets spent. The executive branch is there to execute, and that’s the basis of this legal argument.

“But as of [Wednesday] night, they began to basically massacre every possible implementing agency to deliver on this work. This court case, as important as it is, is not going to change that overnight."

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I know, I know, those pregnant moms were probably selling those antivirals on the black market to terrorists rather than protecting their fetuses.

What did those HIV infected people ever do for the USA to deserve such treatment?

Are they going to give away 50 % of their property as recompensation? I don't think so.

 

[essentialsaltes]

US Terminates Thousands of Life-Saving Health Grants Including For HIV and Malaria. ALL US-made food for malnourished children cancelled.

Grants to hundreds of African HIV organisations providing life-saving services have been terminated with immediate effect via letters received on Thursday morning.

The Trump administration also announced that it was stopping US funding for the Joint UN Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) on Thursday.

Musk Said No One Has Died Since Aid Was Cut. That Isn’t True.​

Peter Donde was a 10-year-old infected with H.I.V. from his mother during childbirth. But American aid kept Peter strong even as his parents died from AIDS. A program started by President George W. Bush called PEPFAR saved 26 million lives from AIDS, and one was Peter’s.

Under PEPFAR, an outreach health worker ensured that Peter and other AIDS orphans got their medicines. Then in January, Trump and Musk effectively shuttered the U.S. Agency for International Development, perhaps illegally, and that PEPFAR outreach program ended. Orphans were on their own.

Without the help of the community health worker, Peter was unable to get his medicines, so he became sick and died in late February, according to Moses Okeny Labani, a health outreach worker who helped manage care for Peter and 144 other vulnerable children.

Achol Deng, an 8-year-old girl, ... she too became sick and died, said Labani.

Another household kept alive by American aid was that of Jennifer Inyaa, a 35-year-old single mom, and her 5-year-old son, Evan Anzoo, both of them H.I.V.-positive. Last month, after the aid shutdown, Inyaa became sick and died, and a week later Evan died as well, according to David Iraa Simon, a community health worker who assisted them.

“Many more children will die in the coming weeks,” said Margret Amjuma, a health worker who confirmed the deaths of Peter and Achol.

Two women, Martha Juan, 25, and Viola Kiden, 28, a mother of three, have already died ... according to Angelina Doki, a health volunteer who supported them.

Doki told me that her own supply of antiretrovirals is about to run out as well.

“I am going to develop the virus,” Doki said. “My viral load will go high. I will develop TB. I will have pneumonia.” She sighed deeply and added, “We are going to die.”

You never forget the sight of children starving to death, so I wish White House officials could have been with me on this trip to South Sudan, where 70 percent of nutrition assistance has come from the United States.

Many of the refugees from Sudan are raped along the way by soldiers or bandits, and upon arrival in South Sudan they used to receive free medical care from a nonprofit supported by the United States. Their sexually transmitted infections were treated, and they were protected from H.I.V.

When I visited, those rape victims were on their own.

When I arrived at the [maternity] clinic to ask questions about it, villagers mistakenly assumed I was somehow responsible for its opening/operation, and were exceedingly grateful. Dong, the new mom, wanted to name her newborn for me. Village leaders assembled under a giant tree outside to show their appreciation. “We want to thank you,” said the town’s chief, James Garang Deng. “Women are safe here now.” Everyone then cheered America’s generosity.

They were unaware that the clinic was closing

 

[That Guy 11200]

Poor people. Brown people. Children.

None of them are fetuses, zygotes, blastocysts or billionaires, so their lives are worthless.