Foreign aid is not the most popular category of government. So when Team DOGE shut down the USAID payment system how did Politico attempt to garner sympathy from its readers for that agency? By absurdly labeling foreign aid as an "industry." In fact, the very title of the foreign aid sympathy story on Tuesday by reporters Maggie Miller and Carmen Paun invokes "industry" as in "Foreign aid freeze results in mass layoffs that could ‘crash’ the industry."
The title is unintentionally ironic since one of those "mass layoffs" could be at Politico itself due to the cutoff of government funding for USAID. Former Fox News producer Kyle Becker offered the receipts:
Fun Fact: @Politico received USAID funds.
— Kyle Becker (@kylenabecker) February 5, 2025
Everything makes sense now. pic.twitter.com/YkkrXhbOui
So we see that team Politico has a vested interest, namely their paychecks clearing the bank, in foreign aid in general and USAID in particular. Their relabeling "foreign aid" as an industry shtick continues right after the title with the subtitle: "Thousands of U.S. workers in the foreign development field are being furloughed or laid off, as the industry coffers run dry."
Yes, the "industry" coffers run dry and apparently so do the Politico coffers at exactly the same time.
Returning to the Politico reportorial duo whose paychecks are in limbo we see they continue to push the idea of foreign aid as an "industry" in the body of the story.
Eight U.S.-based individuals who work in the foreign aid sector, all granted anonymity due to concerns about retaliation from the administration, told POLITICO that the foreign aid freeze had undermined their ability to carry out global aid efforts. Some predict that thousands of foreign aid professionals across the industry may soon be out of work.
And apparently Politico reporters may soon be out of work as well unless they can meet their payroll in the wake of the USAID funding freeze.
One person who spoke to POLITICO said their group had not received federal funding for more than a month. Another individual said they expected multiple non-governmental organizations to declare bankruptcy this week. A third blamed what they said was the “30-day world” of development, where the organizations are paid out by the federal government month to month. If that lapses, funds run out fast, making the situation urgent.
“Every company has lost so much now as a result of offering these furloughs,” one person who works in the industry said. “Even if they start back up say two months from now, there’s likely going to be very few implementations … they will have no more staff.”
Do any of those anonymous persons Politico spoke to happen to have Politico Pro subscriptions. Just asking for a friend below:
I looked at these contracts and I have my own fun fact. This is occurring because agencies (not just USAID) are buying subscriptions to Politico's Pro editorial product, not because Politico is getting grants or other federal funding. https://t.co/3pVWK986bG
— Byron Tau (@ByronTau) February 5, 2025
Now back to the foreign aid "industry."
A State Department spokesperson said via email that some salaries and administrative expenses, including travel for U.S. direct-hire staff conducting ongoing programs, will be allowed to continue under waivers. “Staff have been given a template for waiver requests,” the spokesperson said.
The spokesperson underlined the purpose of the aid freeze was to ensure it’s aligned with the America First foreign policy agenda. “For far too long, the United States foreign aid industry and bureaucracy have not been aligned with American interests, and in many cases, antithetical to American values,” the spokesperson wrote. “They serve to destabilize world peace by promoting ideas in foreign countries that are directly inverse to harmonious and stable relations internal to and among countries.”
Does that spokesperson also have a PoliticoPro subscription? I hear it costs about $10,000 a pop.
Some influential Republicans support the idea of folding USAID into the State Department and welcome a mass restructuring across the industry. Rep. Brian Mast (R-Fla.), who chairs the House Foreign Affairs Committee, told CBS’s Face the Nation on Sunday that he wasn’t concerned about the layoffs “because of the grift that has been working on to the American taxpayer, the American worker.”
"Industry" as in foreign aid industrial complex? It sounds like something that President Eisenhower warned us about.
