Proposed bill to abolish USAID jeopardizes ‘CIA-funded journalism’

Legislation introduced Tuesday by Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) seeks to abolish the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), an organization promoting globalist causes around the world and reportedly acting as the CIA’s propaganda fund.

According to Rep. Gaetz, USAID spreads “radical, leftist ideology across the world” by funding international programs “supporting abortion, gender equity programs, and climate alarmism”. In a press release, the congressman cited a Heritage Foundation report which found — among other discoveries — that in 2021 USAID earmarked $150 billion for “climate finance” alone.

“American taxpayer dollars are being wasted to fund radical leftist propaganda in foreign countries,” said Rep. Gaetz. “The American people will not tolerate government-funded degeneracy at home, and we certainly will not accept its force-feeding abroad under Old Glory.

“USAID does not serve a meaningful purpose. It is used as a slush fund for international wokeism. Therefore, serious lawmakers in Congress should support its complete abolition.”

The bill was introduced just days after Democratic presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr asserted that the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) uses USAID for its propaganda efforts.

In an interview last week with OMG CEO James O’Keefe, Kennedy explained that at one time, American journalists were historically “compromised” by US agencies, which included signing “secrecy agreements” with the CIA. This was the objective of Operation Mockingbird, an operation in which the CIA used news media to propagandize the American people.

But an outcome of the 1975 Church Committee hearings, which investigated abuses by the CIA and other intelligence agencies, was that the CIA agreed to never again use American journalists for propaganda purposes. Instead, the CIA uses international media operatives.

“The CIA promised that it would no longer compromise American journalists,” Kennedy said. “It continued the program to compromise journalists all over the world, and today the CIA is the biggest funder of journalism in the world. They fund it through USAID.”

Kennedy added he believes that an Obama executive order re-opened the door for Project Mockingbird to propagandize the American public, which is evidenced by the deep ties some media operatives have to US intelligence agencies.

USAID is not the only agency said to be a tool for CIA propaganda and activities. 

The National Endowment for Democracy (NED), believed to be a CIA front, receives around $100 million annually from Congress and has been shaping world events since the 1980s, though it vehemently denies being tied to the CIA. The organization is known for having funded rebel forces in Nicaragua during the eighties and having trained and funded protesters during the Arab Spring in 2011, among other regime changes around the world.

For nearly 40 years, NED was helmed by Carl Gershwin, a member of the Socialist Party of America who served as President Ronald Reagan’s ambassador to the UN Human Rights Security Council. In 2021, Gershwin stepped down as the organization’s president and was replaced by Damon Wilson, an intelligence operative from the National Security Council. For ten years prior, Wilson was also executive vice president of the Atlantic Council, a “think tank” which has been working closely with the State Department to fund censorship of undesirable political views in the US and Europe.

NED’s reach and influence permeates seemingly inconsequential locales, such as the Georgian capital of Tbilisi. A small group of gender totalitarians called Tbilisi Pride, dedicated to forcing Georgian society to adopt gender ideology, counts NED as one of its three donors. For the 2023–2024 fiscal year alone, Tbilisi Pride received over 233,550 Georgian Lari ($90,000) from NED for “Supporting LGBTIQ Advocacy and Participation”. This was in addition to nearly $100,000 from the Netherlands government and nearly $80,000 from the UN, totaling nearly 700,650 Georgian Lari ($270,000) for the organization.