USAID employs over 10,000 workers directly and almost all have recalled and are left scrambling to figure out why, how to get home, what will happen to their projects. People in the midst of medical treatments are being abandoned. Note: this is happening here too as NIH and other grants have been cut willy nilly. So people scheduled for cancer treatments are left high and dry. Other kinds of research, life saving research, have been cancelled altogether.
In any case this is leaving people high and dry all over the world but also animals, such as elephants and tigers and the inhabitants of coral reefs, because USAID has also been supporting conservation efforts to protect endangered species and habitats. We won’t be able to replace these creatures and ecosystems once they are gone. I’ve read stories about the rehabilitation of baby elephants in Africa and when they’re old enough to find their people they leave amidst tears of joy and sadness as their caregivers say “Go well” in Swahili. And we have helped these efforts. Now, overnight, we have abandoned the elephants and the people alike.
We had a discussion on a thread here recently in which on commenter repeatedly asked “Why should we send money overseas? Why shouldn’t we prioritize Americans?”
Well, we are all interconnected. Doing good deeds helps Americans indirectly; it helps us directly when we find pathogens in time to avoid pandemics; many drugs and medical devices undergo strict field testing abroad. This helps the people who are test subjects and it also helps us. This kind of soft diplomacy is worth aircraft carriers worth of weapons.
The moral calculus here is not hard to figure. We can’t abandon medical test subjects like this. It is profoundly immoral and wrong. But also it is a betrayal of American values, of kindness and generosity, and certainly of “Christian” values, and since the Trump Administration loudly and obnoxiously proclaims they’re defending Christians and “Christian morals” they deserve to be called out on this issue. They are making a mockery of Christian values.
Finally, to answer that poster who wondered why USAID money is spent “over there” and not on Americans — well it IS spent on Americans. We subsidize farms and businesses here so we can help people around the world. This will hurt Americans.
Already, the grant reductions and cancellations are hurting people and businesses in the US and layoffs have begun. One Trump voter quoted in a WAPO piece I think (I’ve read so many today I’m losing track!) said “I didn’t think the election of Trump would cost me my job, I had a job paying over $140,000/year and now I’m digging into my retirement!”
DUDE. WE TRIED TO WARN YOU.
This is very obviously going to have a ripple effect. Every laid off person spends money in America, and now there will be less of it. That will hurt circles and circles of people and businesses.
But for farmers, already struggling with climate change and fires, floods, droughts, and now the bird flu pandemic that has spread to cattle and decimated chickens, the hit is going to be brutal. It will cost billions.
There’s got to be a way to stop this brutal assault on America. Judges have issued injunctions but for some reason USAID seems to be a prime target and I don't understand why. Going after USAID is immoral and wrong but also it is not legal.
It is illegal; the agency was created and funded by Congress not by President Musk. I think revenge must be a motive in his sick mind and in Trump’s deranged psyche; but it’s hitting everybody around the world.
And, I’m profoundly depressed by Marco Rubio. At least, I thought, he might not be too bad and he’s qualified to be Secretary of State. But his moral compass is in the sewer. He should be defending this agency because it’s a powerful diplomatic tool for the US. And vague accusations of “corruption” within the agency, even if true, don’t amount to a hill of beans compared to the good it has done, often in terribly challenging conditions.
Please, people, don’t stop bothering your Representatives, state AG’s, Governors, write to the newspapers, it is having an effect.
www.washingtonpost.com/...
