6 hours agoTrump interrupts funding the LGBT community in the Western Balkans: Useless Spending
Periskopi(9 months ago)
(9 months ago)US President Donald Trump has cancelled nearly $5 billion in foreign aid approved by Congress, using a maneuver that has not been used in the United States in nearly 50 years. The blockade includes $3.2 billion in development assistance from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), $32m from the Fund [...]
The blockade includes $3.2 billion in development assistance from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), $32m from the Democracy Fund. USAID-state Department, $521m in State Department contributions to international organisations, $333m to the State Department's contributions for peacekeeping activities, and $445m to peacekeeping aid budgeted separately.
The expenditures were destined for a wide range of non-profit organisations and foreign governments and were detained earlier this year by the White House Management and Budget Office (OMB) and were later held in legal suspension due to a lawsuit filed later by the Global Health Council.
The DC Court of Appeals lifted a ban order in this case, opening the door to Trump to continue with the first relief rescue attempt since 1977.
The Trump administration has highlighted spending rumours allegedly in vain, such as $24.6m for <x0m climate resistance “in Honduras, $2.7m for the Democracy Works Foundation in South Africa, which published racist promotional articles including “the problem with White people” and $3.9m to promote democracy among LGBT people in the Western Balkans.
Other highlights include $1.5m to trade Ukrainian women's paintings.
Approximately $838m in the eliminated peacekeeping funds include payments to support the United Nations peacekeeping forces in countries such as the Democratic Republic of Congo, where the Trump administration recently brokered a peace agreement with neighbouring Rwanda and the Central African Republic, where the mission has been criticised as linked to Russian business interests.
The funds earmarked for peace storage include $11m to secure Uruguay's army armoured carriers, $4m for a training centre in Zambia and $3m for barracks to accommodate Kazakh peacekeepers.
The return of funds will not affect US support for the peacekeeping mission of the Multinational Force and Observers along the Egyptian-Israel border.
The legitimacy of attracting funds is a matter of debate, but has little judicial precedent.
The legislative Government's Office of Responsibilities considers the practice illegal; the OMB Trump team says otherwise.
OMB Director Russ Wought, and General Adviser Mark Paoletta have shown cases when presidents Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter, apparently, had canceled in the 1970s.
