Risch urges 'top to bottom' USAID spending review after waste, fraud exposed
Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Sen. Jim Risch, R-Idaho, said a thorough review of spending from U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) is warranted, following the Trump administration's efforts to overhaul the agency.
USAID previously was an independent agency to provide impoverished countries aid and offer development assistance, but the agency was upended since February when President Donald Trump installed Secretary of State Marco Rubio to oversee the organization amid concerns that USAID did not advance U.S. core interests. Since then, the agency has faced layoffs and is being absorbed into the State Department.
This increased scrutiny on USAID spending is valid, according to Risch.
"The amount of money that we're spending on that has to be reviewed top to bottom," Risch said during an event Wednesday at the Washington-based think tank Hudson Institute.
Risch said that several weeks into the Trump administration, he and others, including Rubio, evaluated a list of programs that detailed $3 million in funding for "promotion of democracy in Lower Slobbovia." According to Risch, the description didn't provide enough information and items like these are totaling up to billions of dollars that must undergo review.
"Lower Slobbovia" is a fictional place and a term used by Americans to describe an underdeveloped foreign country."We can do so much better, not only in how, how much money we spend, but how we spend it," Risch said. "So if you say, well, we're eliminating this program, be careful you don't say, 'Oh, that means we're walking away from human rights.' Look, America is human rights. If America leads the way on human rights. We are the world standard on human rights. We have no intention of giving that position up."
The Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) targeted USAID in its push to eliminate wasteful spending. The agency came under fire for many funding choices, including allocating $1.5 million for a program that sought to "advance diversity, equity and inclusion in Serbia's workplaces and business communities" and a $70,000 program for a "DEI musical" in Ireland.
As a result, Rubio announced March 11 that the State Department completed a six-week review and would cancel more than 80% of USAID programs — cutting roughly 5,200 of USAID's 6,200 programs.
Additionally, Fox News Digital was the first to report later in March that the State Department planned to absorb the remaining operations and programs USAID runs so it would no longer function as an independent agency.
The move means eliminating thousands of staff members in an attempt to enhance the existing, "life-saving" foreign assistance programs, according to a State Department memo Fox News Digital obtained.
"Foreign assistance done right can advance our national interests, protect our borders, and strengthen our partnerships with key allies," Rubio said in a March statement to Fox News Digital. "Unfortunately, USAID strayed from its original mission long ago. As a result, the gains were too few and the costs were too high."
"We are reorienting our foreign assistance programs to align directly with what is best for the United States and our citizens," Rubio said. "We are continuing essential lifesaving programs and making strategic investments that strengthen our partners and our own country."
Meanwhile, Democrats slammed the restructuring of the agency, labeling the move "illegal."
"Donald Trump and Elon Musk's destruction and dismantling of USAID is not only disastrous foreign policy and counter to our national security interests; it is plainly illegal," the top Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee Rep. Gregory Meeks, D-N.Y., said in a statement in March. "Congress wrote a law establishing USAID as an independent agency with its own appropriation, and only Congress can eliminate it."
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