Biden administration funds gender confusion in Ecuador
The U.S. State Department is allotting $20,600 to an organization in Ecuador to promote gender disorientation in the South American country. The funds will go towards hosting 3 workshops, 12 drag theatre performances and the production of a 2-minute documentary, all “to promote diversity and inclusion.”
The money will be given to Centro Ecuatoriano Norteamericano (CEN), a “cultural center” supported by the U.S. Embassy and Consulate in Ecuador, according to Fox News.
The grant, which is set to run from September 30, 2022 to August 31, 2023, is just one of several “public diplomacy programs” which aim to “influence foreign publics” in the name of national security.
“To support the achievement of U.S. foreign policy goals and objectives, advance national interests, and enhance national security by informing and influencing foreign publics and by expanding and strengthening the relationship between the people and government of the United States and citizens of the rest of the world,” says USAspending.gov.
While CEM has received a total of $57,200 from the US State Department since 2010 for four different grants, including speaking engagements, presentations and marketing services, Ecuador is the first country to receive a cash injection to promulgate gender anxiety.
A State Department spokesperson told Newsweek last week that the purpose of the program is to "provide new opportunities for LGBTQI+ Ecuadorians to express themselves freely and safely."
"The program will advance key U.S. values of diversity and the inclusion of LGBTQI+ communities as well as promote the acceptance of communities that are disproportionately affected by violence,” the spokesperson said.
"LGBTQI+ people across the globe deserve to live in societies free from targeted violence and discrimination,” added the spokesperson. “Recent data suggest an alarming and deadly rise in violence against LGBTQI+ persons in Ecuador.”
But the State Department has not provided those data, nor did it respond to an America’s Frontline News request for the data.
In fact, much of the State Department’s “data” appear to be hearsay complaints made by “LGBTQI+ activists,” which are then recorded as human rights abuses in the State Department’s 2021 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices.
Some of those complaints include the Ecuadorian government stopping the provision of “retroviral treatment and hormones to LGBTQI+ patients” at the height of the pandemic “to focus resources on COVID-19 treatment.” The report complains “the sudden unavailability adversely affected LGBTQI+ individuals undergoing medical treatment.”
Another complaint alleges “14 members of the LGBTQI+ community had been killed in 2020 and seven more as of September 3,” and that the police did not sufficiently investigate if these were hate crimes. This brings the number up to 21 in nearly two years, still short of the 37 deaths in the United States in 2020 alone. Honduras, which reportedly had 20 deaths in 2020, has yet to receive drag show funding from the State Department.
The report acknowledges that the murderer of one gender anxiety victim was sentenced to nearly 35 years in prison by an Ecuadorian court.
Other human rights abuses alleged in the complaint is that Ecuador does not allow minors to change their gender on identity documents even with parental consent. The allegation appears to be based on a case reported by an NGO in 2019 in which a minor was denied enrollment in 15 schools under her “new” name and gender. After the parents filed a lawsuit, Ecuador’s Office of the Civil Registry allowed the gender to be changed on the identity card.
On its Country Information page for travelers, the State Department acknowledges “There are no legal restrictions on same-sex sexual relations or the organization of LGBTI events in Ecuador,” and displays no warning about “an alarming and deadly rise in violence against LGBTQI+ persons in Ecuador.”
