Reclaiming Our Sovereignty: ‘AID’ and the American People

In 1961, President John F. Kennedy started the U.S. Agency for International Development with a strategic vision to expand American partnership and repel Soviet influence. He understood then what President Donald Trump and Secretary Marco Rubio do now – American foreign policy cannot remain static. It must evolve to meet the demands of the moment and the needs of the American people.

USAID forgot its imperative to serve the American people first

Unfortunately, as the Cold War ended, broad demand for closure or reform of the agency was suppressed. Instead, the Clinton administration ignited a global development complex, pursuing open-ended ideas and commitments without a genuine mission that returned any value to Americans. Post-conflict nation-building, political inclusion, sustainable development, gender ideology, and much worse have grown into euphemistic word soup completely disconnected from America’s core national interests. Decades of America’s misaligned foreign assistance enterprise have added over $4 trillion to our national debt. 

But this is a new era. On Day One, President Trump launched a bold, unprecedented, and comprehensive review of how the Department of State and other federal agencies have been spending hard-earned taxpayer dollars abroad. For nearly two months, under Secretary Rubio’s leadership and the indispensable partnership of DOGE, we scrutinized programs, evaluated lines of effort, examined sub-program expenditures and budgets, and identified core capabilities. As a result, Secretary Rubio announced the cancellation of 83% of the programs at USAID and thousands of inappropriate programs at the Department of State.

Giving to people who despise us

We have given billions of dollars to countries who despise us and other countries that only bring us more security challenges and never emerge with good governance of their own. We have given aid to criminals who exploit populations we aim to help. We exacerbate conflict by pumping resources into regions that cannot absorb them, destabilizing areas only to then invest even more. In some cases, that money has fueled terrorism. Even in less severe situations, decades of spending only deepened global dependency. We have, in effect, created a global welfare state, committed unwelcome political interventions, encouraged unsustainable international labor unions (communism), made countries less capable of thriving in the modern global economy, and funded international organizations that spite our great country. In other dizzying cases, America’s foreign assistance has been used to undercut Americans’ freedoms right here at home.

Time to put the good programs under the State Department

In view of our rich history, the plunder of American taxes for the aid enterprise is indeed a shocking failure that defies explanation until you scrutinize the ecosystem and who benefited. Through this review, it has become abundantly clear that the mindset gripping foreign assistance for decades was one that prioritized funding overseas slush funds instead of delivering results for Americans. Tens of billions of dollars annually are filtered through 27 different inefficient payment systems to an “aid industrial complex” dominated by a small number of major contractors, which leaves just 10% of award dollars to local partners. This canard was proliferated by Washington’s elite, who enriched themselves and guarded their turf, one fiscal cycle after another.

But President Trump has turned the page.

As we move beyond decades of kicking reform down the road, the State Department and USAID will work with Congress to move roughly 1,000 USAID programs over to State, where, as Mr. Elon Musk noted, they “should always have been.” To that end, we will build additional capacity at State to manage these programs effectively. The consolidation of foreign assistance at State, along with the ongoing government-wide review of all foreign assistance programs, will establish a baseline to evaluate the effectiveness and ensure a coordinated strategy of America’s foreign assistance regime.

The American people have needed this review for a long time

That type of comprehensive review is long overdue. It is difficult, perhaps impossible, to argue America’s position in the world is stronger as a result. Of course, there are rare success stories that serve America’s common defense and general welfare. We should celebrate and build on those, but only for our national interest.

President Trump and Secretary Rubio promised to put Americans first. That is exactly what we’ve done during the first two months and will continue to do every single day of this administration.

This article was originally published by RealClearPolitics and made available via RealClearWire.