One month ago many of us had only a vague idea of what it was USAID did. Rather, what it was supposed to do. We believed it engaged in humanitarian aid for underdeveloped nations.

Hah.

Had we known that it’s a massive left-wing slush fund advancing a Marxist globalist agenda with little accountability and run by insubordinate radical leaders, we would have demanded it be shuttered long ago.

The US Agency for International Development was created by President John F. Kennedy executive order on November 3, 1961. Because it was not created by an act of Congress, USAID can be abolished by executive order.

President Trump is not dismantling USAID, however. It’s being reorganized, audited and placed under the auspices of the State Department. Elon Musk described the agency as a “ball of worms.”

As of yesterday, the USAID offices on Pennsylvania Avenue were closed to workers who were ordered to stay home.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced that he was now acting director of the agency.

As we watched with bemusement the wailing and gnashing of teeth from the left over the scandal unfolding at USAID, it’s worth noting some of the wacky woke projects that were funded under the leadership of far-left loon Samantha Power. Her DEI/LGBTQI pet projects were introduced in many nations where they were creating problems for American diplomacy.

Here she is, refusing to answer questions from Sen. Rand Paul about whether USAID funded military medical research in China.

Oh and here’s a sampling of some of the garbage on which USAID wasted American tax dollars:

$2.5 million for electric vehicles in Vietnam

$1.5 million to advance DEI in Serbian workplaces

$1.99 million on strengthening trans-led organizations to deliver gender-affirming health care in Guatemala.

$969,821 to Stephen Leonelli of Washington DC for supporting “development, democracy and innovation inclusive development hub programs protecting the human rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender queer and intersex individuals.”

$45 million DEI scholarships Burma

$520 million for consultant derive ESG investment in Africa

$1.2 billion to undisclosed recipients.

$500,000 to promote atheism in Nepal

$47,000 for a transgender opera in Colombia

$32,000 for a transgender comic book in Peru

$20,000 for drag shows in Ecuador 

Oh, and meet Jay Gilliam, the LGBTQI director of USAID. He earns $125,000 annually.

As we review the promiscuous spending of our money by Washington bureaucrats, I’m reminded of a speech Rep. Davey Crockett gave in the House of Representatives more than 100 years ago.

It’s been called the “Not Yours To Give” oration.

Seems a retired naval officer had died and Congress was considering a bill to give his widow who had fallen on hard times $20,000. 

Crockett opposed the measure and explained why. His words echo through the years. 

Mr. Speaker — I have as much respect for the memory of the deceased, and as much sympathy for the suffering of the living, if suffering there be, as any man in this House, but we must not permit our respect for the dead or our sympathy for a part of the living to lead us into an act of injustice to the balance of the living.

       “I will not go into an argument to prove that Congress has no power to appropriate this money as an act of charity. Every member upon this floor knows it. We have the right, as individuals, to give away as much of our own money as we please in charity; but as members of Congress we have no right to so appropriate a dollar of the public money.

       “Some eloquent appeals have been made to us upon the grounds that it is a debt due the deceased. Mr. Speaker, the deceased lived long after the close of the war; he was in office to the day of his death, and I have never heard that the government was in arrears to him. This government can owe no debts but for services rendered, and at a stipulated price. If it is a debt, how much is it? Has it been audited, and the amount due ascertained? If it is a debt, this is not the place to present it for payment, or to have its merits examined. If it is a debt, we owe more than we can ever hope to pay, for we owe the widow of every soldier who fought in the War of 1812 precisely the same amount.

       “There is a woman in my neighborhood, the widow of as gallant a man as ever shouldered a musket. He fell in battle. She is as good in every respect as this lady, and is as poor. She is earning her daily bread by her daily labor; and if I were to introduce a bill to appropriate five or ten thousand dollars for her benefit, I should be laughed at, and my bill would not get five votes in this House. There are thousands of widows in the country just such as the one I have spoken of, but we never hear of any of these large debts to them.

       “Sir, this is no debt. The government did not owe it to the deceased when he was alive; it could not contract it after he died. I do not wish to be rude, but I must be plain. Every man in this House knows it is not a debt. We cannot, without the grossest corruption, appropriate this money as the payment of a debt. We have not the semblance of authority to appropriate it as a charity.

       “Mr. Speaker, I have said we have the right to give as much money of our own as we please. I am the poorest man on this floor. I cannot vote for this bill, but I will give one week’s pay to the object, and if every member of Congress will do the same, it will amount to more than the bill asks.”

USAID has long worked on murky projects with the CIA. At this point, it appears the agency is little more than a money-laundering operation to enrich leftists and promote their radical agendas. 

Far left groups come up with some sort of cockamamie project, it’s funded by USAID, the money flows into the pockets of influence peddlers in Washington who then contribute to the political campaigns of those who merrily fund the agency. Oh, and 97% or all political contributions from USAID workers went to Democrats.

If you’ll excuse the expression, this is a big circle jerk.

Watch which politicians howl the loudest about USAID. Chances are they and their cronies have been greedily slurping up your tax dollars for years.

Shut it down, Mr. President. Turn the FBI loose on the agency to sniff out the fraud.

Then, let worthy projects that further American interests get their money directly from Congress.

Crockett and Rubio are right: Charity should be voluntary and is not the job of government

The USAID does not run on donor money. It runs on our tax dollars. 

They’re not yours to give.