by Steven Richards and John Solomon
The internal watchdog warned the agency that it was not sufficiently vetting for terrorists or getting the U.N. to comply with transparency requirements.
Just days before Elon Musk began a purge at USAID, the foreign aid agency was warned in a stinging memo from its internal watchdog that it lacked significant transparency into how its grants were being spent and it faced stiff resistance from foreign entities when trying to investigate potential fraud or corruption.
The memo, which was published by the Inspector General of the U.S. Agency for International Development in late January, details some long-standing concerns about how safeguards against misuse of funds and the proper authorities to hold violators accountable are missing from the Office of Inspector General’s toolbox.
"Incredibly politicized"
This memorandum "identifies vulnerabilities and challenges which we believe hinder accountability and transparency within Agency programs,” Inspector General Paul Martin wrote to the acting administrator of the agency.
Fred Fleitz, a former Trump National Security Council official, told Just the News that a key concern of the administration is ensuring the money is being spent wisely and on causes benefitting U.S. interests.
“[USAID] has been incredibly politicized for leftist political goals by the Democrats. It's become a politicized boondoggle, and we saw that over the last 48–72 hours. We know that USAID officials were trying to subvert Trump's effort, or his order to freeze foreign aid for 90 days, so we can see what our tax dollars are being paid for, and is it in the interest of the United States? Is it America First?” Fleitz told the John Solomon Reports podcast on Monday.
Inspector General Martin identified three main areas of vulnerability: “Resistance from United Nations (UN) agencies and foreign-based nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) to sharing information with OIG about potential misconduct;” “Limitations on vetting of aid organizations for ties to designated terrorist organizations and known corrupt actors;” and “Limitations in obtaining data about USAID-funded sub-awardees.”
You can read the report below:
The Trump administration’s efforts to shutter the agency following these ongoing transparency issues also bring criticism that its leadership has failed to respond to explicit policy directives from the State Department and the wider executive branch to align its programs with Trump policies and the U.S. national interest.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who has now been designated the acting director of USAID, shared these concerns while visiting El Salvador on Monday.
“Well, look, my frustration with USAID goes back to my time in Congress,” Rubio told reporters on Monday while visiting El Salvador. “It’s a completely unresponsive agency. It’s supposed to respond to policy directives from the State Department and it refuses to do so.”
Rubio also said that the agency’s repeated failures to respond to questions about how funds were being spent in certain programs precipitated the actions from Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency, which is operating in close coordination with the White House.
Mike Benz, the founder of the Foundation for Freedom Online, chronicled how USAID spent funds encouraging censorship across the globe. He said the agency’s record of funding controversial or freedom-damaging projects had eroded its trust across the globe.
“USAID has systematically corrupted the American and world trust in the institutions that keep society going,” he said.
UN resistance to oversight
According to the inspector general’s report, a quarter of USAID’s programming —around $8 billion — goes through “public international organizations,” which include United Nations agencies and development banks. Because these programs often occur in “emergency environments,” the OIG relies on these organizations to self-report any potential fraudulent activities.
But, despite contractual obligations for awardees to report potential fraud or mismanagement, the OIG says UN agencies delay notifications or entirely fail to report instances of potential misconduct to the watchdog.
For example, though the World Food Program reported 519 instances of potential misconduct to USAID, the inspector general was only notified of 29 of those instances, despite contractual obligations to promptly notify the office, the report shows.
Additionally, the inspector general said the agency lacked mechanisms to ensure that any individuals accused of corruption or misconduct would not be “recirculated” to other U.N. agencies funded by USAID.
The inspector general raised concerns last year that an exemption for UN agencies vetting local partners in Gaza would inadvertently facilitate aid to terrorist organizations like Hamas. This followed findings that several employees of the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) participated in the Oct. 7, 2023, cross-border terrorist attack on Israel.
Insufficient anti-terror monitoring, aid diversion
The inspector general also warned about the limits on the agency’s ability to monitor expenditures for programs in “nonpermissive” environments, like conflict zones in Ukraine or Gaza, and identified gaps in data collection for sub-awardees — the recipients of U.S. cash that passes through international or local organizations that are sponsored by USAID.
In particular, the most recent memo warned that contractors are not currently required to complete the same pre-award antiterrorism certification that was implemented for grantees to prevent U.S. funding from inadvertently going to causes or groups affiliated with terrorist groups. The inspector general first brought this concern to USAID in 2018, but noted that the lack of action has present risks for current operations in regions with terrorist groups.
Knowingly diverted food kits
“At the time, USAID committed to attempting to address this vulnerability through the regulatory process, but to date, there has been no regulatory change,” the inspector general concluded. “The absence of a required certification for USAID-funded contractors working in regions where designated terrorist organizations such as Hamas and Hezbollah operate freely leaves USAID’s programming vulnerable.”
For example, employees for one organization in Syria knowingly diverted food kits funded by USAID to the Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), a group formed by former Al-Qaeda leaders in Syria that is designated a terrorist organization by the United States, a review by USAID found.
In 2023, a scheme to divert USAID-sponsored food aid in Ethiopia was uncovered by some aid workers. According to reporting from Reuters, the UN’s World Food Program — a close partner of USAID — was aware that aid was being stolen from its programs for years before the discovery. From there, the thousands of tons of USAID-funded grain shipments meant to feed the hungry in the midst of civil conflict in the Ethiopian region of Tigray was diverted to the warring armies and the black market.
“So here we are empowering, not just other countries, but in some cases, people that hate us and, you know, want to do us harm,” Rep. Eric Burlison, R-Mo., told the John Solomon Reports podcast.
“In a time in which you know that we're at $36 trillion in debt, there comes a point when you've got to take care of yourself before you can start thinking about taking care of other people. And at the end of the day, I'm of the belief that it's not even my responsibility to be charitable with taxpayer dollars,” he continued.
The inspector general also found that “USAID does not maintain a comprehensive internal database of sub-awardees,” meaning the United States cannot identify, vet, or track many of the organizations that ultimately receive U.S. funding after it is dispersed to international organizations or groups that serve as middle men.
“The lack of a centralized and comprehensive internal database of sub-awardees delays OIG investigative activity and our ability to check with trusted foreign law enforcement partners to see if fraud allegations or findings against a local entity involve USAID funds,” the inspector general warned.
Condoms, Diversity, and Disinformation
In recent days, the Trump administration USAID-identified programs ranging from contraceptives for Afghanistan to LGBT diversity programs for European countries were clear evidence that foreign aid needed to be paused and reevaluated, a task the Rubio State Department said it would begin starting Monday.
Just the News has previously reported how USAID was intimately involved with the censorship industry that emerged during the COVID-19 pandemic.
After President Biden took office in early 2021, USAID wrote a "Disinformation Primer” to address “disinformation and misinformation,” Just the News reported.
"Just as human rights advocates have argued that internet access is a human right and that there is a fundamental right to access of information, there is also a right not to be disinformed," the primer reads, detailing 10 steps for USAID and partners to take in "countering and preventing disinformation.”
The steps include partnering with other governments, supporting "media monitoring and fact-checking initiatives," and "form[ing] synergies" with "civil society, media, social media platforms, internet governance forums, and other donors" to fight disinformation.
Steven Richards and John Solomon
Source: https://justthenews.com/accountability/watchdogs/trump-purge-usaid-memo-warned-agency-its-vulnerabilities-doling-out
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