In the United States, there always comes a time when the urge to restart the circus strikes. Seemingly lacking any theoretical or doctrinal framework, taking shape as they go, the mechanisms implemented by Donald Trump effectively defy orthodoxy. A trade war with China, Mexico, and Canada, the public humiliation of Volodymyr Zelensky, a raid on Ukrainian raw materials, open contempt for the European Union, threats against Greenland and Panama, tougher sanctions against the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela…

Inside USAID

BY Maurice LEMOINE 

Nothing else? Yes, of course! Internally, the announcement of a cataclysm. A political purge of the federal administration, deemed too wasteful and subservient to the Democrats. Thousands of contractors and federal agents find themselves on the street—including within the Department of Justice and sensitive sectors of the Pentagon and the FBI. There you have it. The unpredictable. A world is collapsing, rules are drifting, codes are being annulled.

If well-trained, the Great Dane is no more aggressive than other dogs. On the other hand, the American DOGE is similar to the pit bull: a dangerous animal representing a serious and immediate peril. To lead the carnage, Donald Trump has entrusted the plutocrat Elon Musk, one of his key supporters during the election campaign, with the direction of the Department of Government Efficiency, the DOGE in question. This one bites very hard: 2.3 million civil servants are initially being encouraged to resign with a salary compensation package until September. If they refuse this severance package, the worst will happen to them.

The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) has led the way. Overseen by the President, the State Department, and the National Security Council (NSC), it is present in more than 100 countries and has nearly 10,000 employees. As early as January 26, Trump announced "a reevaluation and realignment of U.S. foreign aid," telling the press that it was run "by a handful of radical lunatics." Musk, who considers it a criminal organisation, "a nest of radical Marxist vipers who hate America," believes it's time for this institution to die. Indeed, its Washington headquarters, the Ronald Reagan Building (RRB), was closed on February 3 and its operations suspended for 90 days. With the exception of 611 key officials responsible for critical functions, central management, and specially designated programs, all employees worldwide have been placed on administrative leave. Pending a reduction in staff expected to affect approximately 2,000 of them in the United States, the "rested" agents in Washington were given only fifteen minutes to collect their personal belongings from the RRB. Contempt raised to an art form in the land of the free.

Insanity and madness, the matter immediately caused a stir. USAID's budget reached $44 billion in 2024. According to the Financial Tracking Service (FTS) of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), the United States had allocated $327.4 million in "humanitarian funding" worldwide alone for 2025. However, in multiple countries, immediately after the executive order was signed in the Oval Office, international entities, governments, non-governmental organisations (NGOs), and suppliers of goods and services were notified of the suspension of funding for ongoing or planned programs. In France, in a virtuous column published by the daily newspaper Le Monde (February 25), Najat Vallaud-Belkacem and Guillaume Gonin protested—"USAID provides food, water, and healthcare to victims of natural disasters and malnutrition"—recalling, to clarify their point, "how Ebola was largely contained thanks to the Agency's prevention and treatment policy." Others publicly expressed concern about the interruption of funding for the activities of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), the Colombian police's anti-drug air operations, the reception of Venezuelans seeking refuge in Brazil, or coca crop substitution programs in several South American countries, to cite just a few telling examples. Appointed by Trump as Acting Administrator of USAID, Cuban-American Secretary of State Marco Rubio immediately froze 83% of aid sent abroad (5,200 contracts canceled), with two notable exceptions, for exemplary democracies: Egypt and Israel. Humanitarian aid has its priorities. However, at odds with some of his colleagues, Rubio is not particularly in favour of dismantling the organisation. From El Salvador, during his first tour of Central America, he declared of the organisation: "Some of the things it does are good; others raise serious doubts." A statement that we will consider reasonable here. But not necessarily for the same reasons that are swirling around Rubio's head.

Great anger. "The freeze on US aid funding is sowing chaos throughout the world, including in journalism," denounces the French organisation Reporters Without Borders (RSF). The frozen programs provide vital support for projects that strengthen media, transparency, and democracy [1]. The rest of the statement has the merit of clarity: USAID programs support “independent” media (we add the quotation marks) in more than 30 countries, but it is difficult to assess the full extent of the impact. According to USAID data from 2023, “the agency funded training and supported 6,200 journalists, assisted 707 non-state media outlets, and supported 279 civil society organisations working to strengthen independent media.” The 2025 foreign aid budget included some $268 million allocated by the US Congress to support “independent media and the free flow of information.”

From other, equally concerned media sources, we soon learned that in Georgia, "almost all independent media operate thanks to foreign funding," that in Ukraine, according to a study published in May 2024 by the Live Media Forum, "approximately 75% of media outlets remained partially or totally dependent on foreign subsidies, the majority of which were American" [2], that...

Some time before its "SOS USAID" press release, RSF, in its exhilarating task of "defending information" and pluralism, had published a diatribe of a completely different tone: "Behind a misleading name, International Reporters is in reality a new website serving Moscow. Financed by the Kremlin's influence networks, it mobilises international propagandists, often based in Russia, to reach a foreign audience. (...) RSF denounces this propaganda tool that pollutes the information space [3]." It would be enough to get lost in it. But no. Please don't laugh. A Washington-funded "news" source is "independent"; a Moscow-appointed media outlet engages in "disinformation."

These arguments don't hold water. Both are propaganda tools. They simply pursue opposing goals. Leila Bicakcic, director of the Center for Investigative Journalism—a Bosnian organisation supported by USAID—has the honesty to admit that "if you receive funding from the U.S. government, there are certain topics you simply won't cover, because the U.S. government has interests that come before all others."[4]

Included in the scam is the RSF, led between 1985 and 2008 by the far-right activist Robert Ménard: an "independent" NGO (it too!) financed, among others, at the time, by the Center for Free Cuba - a foundation involved, from Miami, in terrorist actions on Cuban territory - and the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), created in 1982 by Ronald Reagan to publicly finance those whom the CIA was secretly subsidising before multiple scandals forced it to keep a low profile [5]. With, as a corollary, in the case of RSF, an unconditional defense of Latin American media practicing lies, incitement to violence and support for the destabilisation of their respective countries, as well as incessant attacks against progressive Latino governments (to name only the geographical area that will be discussed in this article). This, of course, is to the great satisfaction of American imperialism.

With all access to USAID's website having been shut down, it is difficult to compile a complete list of media outlets (and journalists with relatively loose ethics) who have occasionally or regularly received its payments. However—and this is not a new discovery—many were already well-known. Others, shamelessly, are drawing attention to their cases themselves. Thus, on January 21, the Nicaragua Investiga website warned that Trump's executive order "threatens to deal a severe blow" to his anti-Sandinista crusade, as this support is a "fundamental pillar" in the efforts of the hard right and pseudo-social democrats to undermine the influence and overthrow President Daniel Ortega [6].

On February 26, Cubanet, an "independent" media outlet founded in 1994 in Miami to campaign against the island's government, received a similar warning: its three-year $1.8 million grant from USAID was being cut. In 2024, it had been specifically allocated $500,000 to mobilise "the island's Cuban youth through objective and uncensored multimedia journalism." Diario de Cuba (based in Madrid; $1.3 million from 2016 to 2020), ADN Cuba ($3 million from 2020 to 2024), El Toque (a major provider of chatbots [7] for the island's public on WhatsApp, Telegram, and Messenger), and CiberCuba are also seeing their funding dwindle. Sweeping aside all capacity for reason, an outpouring of emotion accompanied the most spectacular of announcements: the historic leaders of the anti-Cuban media industry, Radio and TV Martí, will cease their vociferous rants. Since their inception—1984 for the radio station, 1990 for its television counterpart—they have cost the US federal budget some $800 million to vainly maintain the dream of the enemies of the Cuban revolution: to finally dance on Fidel Castro's grave.

In El Salvador, Gato Encerrado, El Faro, Revista La Brújula, Focos, Mala Yerba, Factum, and Ilumina are calling on their readers to bridge the chasm opening beneath their impartiality. Bad times are also in Colombia: highly critical of centre-left President Gustavo Petro, La Silla Vacia (45.9% of whose revenue came from USAID in 2023) and the Foundation for Press Freedom (FLIP) are seeing a looming financial crisis. The same panic is occurring in Venezuela for Efecto Cocuyo and the armada of influencers under anti-Bolivarian influence.

This situation is all the more "worrying" for local right-wing groups as these so-called "made in the US" alternative media outlets provide abundant coverage to the international press, making what they report, exaggerate, or invent a widely accepted and widely reported reality.

In France, the grief reached its peak on France Culture's morning show. On March 18, in a voice literally shattered by shock, Catherine Duthu, head of the International Press Review, delivered the terrible news: what Hitler, Stalin, Mao, and Putin had failed to achieve, Trump had done. Voice of America (VOA) had just ceased broadcasting (temporarily or permanently), and 1,300 of its employees were placed on leave. Directly controlled by the state and broadcast in 63 languages ​​to 400 million listeners, VOA is the U.S. government's international broadcasting service. In terms of impartiality, we've already done better. When it comes to Latin America, VOA has been in the news for a very long time. Among other feats of arms, she led the media campaigns that, like artillery preparations, preceded the overthrow of Jacobo Árbenz in Guatemala (1954), the attempted Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba (1961), the coup d'état against the progressive Juan Bosch in the Dominican Republic (1963), and the invasion of that country by the Marines in 1965.

When she discusses a "Latino" topic, with a marked interest in the demonisation of Nicaragua, Venezuela, and the region's left-wing, so-called "populist" rulers (with the possible exception of Brazil's Lula), Duthu regularly cites this "independent" radio station (we're not making this up!) [8], which she will clearly miss greatly. Guillaume Erner, head of the morning show, is choking on Duthu: Radio Free Europe, which yesterday contributed to "fracturing the Eastern Bloc," will also fall silent [9]. With America's loudspeakers falling silent, objective—that is, pro-imperialist—information will no longer be what it was.

Rest assured at France Culture: all is not lost. On March 21, RSF filed a complaint against the Trump administration demanding an immediate halt to the dissolution of VOA and the swift reinstatement of its employees.

One detail, by the way. To justify the closure of VOA and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Musk barked: "It's just crazy leftists talking to each other while whistling a billion dollars from taxpayers." We will never know whether he believes what he says or not. With the exception of the mentioned bundle of dollars, it's in any case grotesque, unbelievable, and very funny.

In another vein, Le Monde implicitly protests, NGOs working on China, the Uighurs, or the Tibetans are in the same situation, "but few of their representatives are willing to speak out, so as not to underscore their dependence on American aid, an obvious angle of attack for Beijing." This is enough, for some, to vilify Xi Jinping, but also, for others, to raise a cautious eyebrow at the flood of information and rumours, each more accusatory than the last, whenever these countries are mentioned—"cultural genocide," "sterilisation," "torture," "religious persecution," "forced labor" [10]...

Less than a quarter of the global humanitarian budget is financed by private funds. Three-quarters of this is paid by individual states. Yet, only twenty countries, most of them NATO members or allies, pay 97% of government spending on humanitarian aid [11]. By providing 42% of this global budget, USAID occupies a prominent place in the mix.

Created on November 3, 1961, by John F. Kennedy, at the height of the Cold War, USAID was created at the same time as the Alliance for Progress, specifically aimed at Latin America. In the latter case, it was a response to the Cuban Revolution and the rise of armed and unarmed national liberation movements. A financial aid tool for development intended to reduce poverty, the Alliance's experiment ended ten years later without having achieved its objectives despite the $20 billion it injected. At that time, in Chile, President Salvador Allende intended to tackle the unresolved problems by another route: a democratically elected socialist government.

While the Alliance for Progress faded, USAID survived. Pursuing its initial objectives by other means. Less altruistic, one might say—if indeed those of the Alliance for Progress were altruistic. Which forces us to revisit all sorts of crazy old stories the world has forgotten.

Between 1960 and 1970, USAID partnered with the CIA's Bureau of Public Security, a department accused of training thousands of Vietnamese, Filipino, Indonesian, and Thai police and military personnel in "terrorism and torture techniques" [12]. In 1970, USAID served as a cover for FBI agent Dan Mitrione, who was sent to Uruguay to also teach "advanced counterinsurgency techniques." In other words, to eliminate anyone whose social ideas might become disturbing. An expert in torture, the "Yankee" spent time in Brazil during the coup d'état from 1962 to 1967. Then, in 1965, in the Dominican Republic, during the landing of "marines" tasked with perpetuating the overthrow of President Juan Bosch. To his uniformed students, Mitrione passed on his core business: "The exact pain, in the exact place, in the exact amount, to obtain the desired effect." In Uruguay, the adventure didn't end exactly as he had planned: unmasked and kidnapped by the Tupamaros revolutionaries, he was executed on August 10, 1970 [13].

At his funeral in the United States, White House spokesman Ron Ziegler described him as a man whose "dedicated service to the cause of peaceful progress in an orderly world will remain an example to all free men." There was undoubtedly a touch of USAID in all that...

Asia, South America, Central America: the Cold War had no favourites. That same year, 1970, at least 30,000 Guatemalan police officers had already received counterinsurgency training organised and funded by USAID. Civil war had been raging in the country since 1960 – a consequence of the overthrow of Jacobo Árbenz in 1954 [14]; It ended in 1996 with 200,000 deaths and disappearances, 80% of them of indigenous origin, according to the UN.

Between 1996 and 2000, when Peruvian dictator Alberto Fujimori ordered and instigated the forced sterilisation of 300,000 women, mostly poor and indigenous, USAID funded the operations with $35 million.

These are things we hesitate to share with sensitive souls outraged by USAID's misfortunes. Likewise, it would probably be better to avoid detailing the resumes of some of its leaders.

Not exhaustive, just for the sake of discussion...

From 1981 to 1983, under President Ronald Reagan, USAID's Latin American division was headed by the far-right ideologue Otto Reich. When he left this position, he created the Bureau of Public Diplomacy, an office attached to the State Department from which he fed the press with rumours – today we would call them “fake news” – about Nicaragua, reporting the Sandinista government’s acquisition of Soviet MIGs or chemical weapons as real as those later invoked by Colin Powell to justify the invasion of Iraq. Reich also collaborated with the team of Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North, who organised a secret arms trafficking with Iran to finance the equipment of the “contras” (Nicaraguan counter-revolutionaries). Nearly ten years later, Reich was appointed special envoy for the Western Hemisphere (the American continent) by President George Bush I. A lawyer for the military industry (Lockheed Martin), he was Undersecretary of State for Latin America in the Bush II administration and directly involved in the attempted coup against Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez on April 11, 2002.

Mark B. Feierstein, USAID's Assistant Administrator for Latin America and the Caribbean, revealed in 2012 that Washington prioritises support for opposition forces "fighting for human rights and democracy" in Cuba, Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador, and Nicaragua, and that funding is provided to anti-government groups based in these countries [15]. This is already a form of admission. These would be complete if Feierstein specified that he was a US intelligence agent; also a "project manager" of the dirty war waged in Nicaragua against the Sandinista government during the 1980s; and a key player in the flight abroad of former Bolivian head of state Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada, responsible during his term in October 2003 for a massacre that left 67 dead and 400 injured. Before joining USAID as Deputy Director, Donald Steinberg served, among other assignments, on the White House National Security Council (African Affairs) and headed the Washington diplomatic office in South Africa before the end of the apartheid regime.

José Cárdenas, Deputy Regional Director for Latin America under the George W. Bush administration, also served on the National Security Council during that same administration and championed the concept of "preemptive strikes." In 2013, he gained notoriety for his dedication to sustainable development or the quality of life in recipient countries, but for attempting to interfere in an internal USAID investigation into possible corruption in the management of funds intended for subversive activities abroad.

More recently, in January 2021, Democratic President Joe Biden announced the nomination of Samantha Power to head the agency. Here again, many details attract attention. In a book published in 2002 [16], Power theorised the "responsibility to protect" (R2P), a "soft" version of the right of intervention used later (2011) to justify international military intervention and the destruction of Libya [17]. In the meantime, although disagreeing with the methods of George W. Bush, Power supported the war against Iraq: "A US intervention will probably improve the lives of Iraqis," she declared in an interview on March 10, 2003. From the positions she subsequently held at the State Department and the National Security Council - definitely the royal road to the direction of USAID - under the presidency of Barack Obama, she strongly supported military interventions in Libya and Syria. During the confirmation hearing preceding her nomination as U.S. Ambassador to the UN (2013-2017), she declared before the Senate: "This country is the greatest in the world. I will never apologise on behalf of the United States!"

At the UN, Power criticised the institution for its "unequal treatment" of the "Jewish state" and for its "indefensible" silence in the face of "terrorist attacks against Israelis." Incidentally, whether during Operation Cast Lead (December 2008; 1,300 Palestinians killed) or today, as the massacre of Gazans unfolds before the eyes of the world, Power has never been heard to invoke her ever-changing obsession, the "responsibility to protect." [18]

A stint at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, where she worked as an assistant to Morton Abramowitz, former administrator of the NED (the presentable version of the CIA!), and here is our "humanitarian hawk," as she calls herself, at the head of USAID.

So, what?

Nothing!

As usual, in an orgy of "humanitarian" funds, the institution devotes itself to the "non-violent" destabilisation of countries considered "non-friendly" or "non-vassal" – starting with Cuba, Nicaragua, and Venezuela.

Okay, okay, aaaaagree: there is a respectable version of USAID's activities, ranging from childhood vaccinations to ensuring access to drinking water for populations, from the fight against malnutrition to funding major UN organisations—UNICEF, the World Food Programme (WFP), the International Organization for Migration (IOM), the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), etc.—a well-articulated system of "smart power," but ultimately with salutary and particularly important objectives.

However, what does support for political parties, introduced in 2003 under the George W. Bush administration, have to do with these noble aims? In theory, this support is only permitted under certain conditions: all "democratic" parties in the country concerned must receive "equitable levels of support," with the understanding that these must in no way "affect electoral results."

In Haiti, this played out this way: in 2011, shortly after Washington helped reverse the results of the presidential election to bring Michel Martelly (who came in third in the first round) to power, USAID allocated nearly $100,000 to the Tet Kalé Movement (MTK), which was close to the new head of state. The transfer of funds was made through the Office of Transition Initiatives (OTI), a branch of USAID, and more precisely through a for-profit company, Chemonics. According to the latter, this support was intended to finance the cleanup of the capital “before the presidential takeover” [19]. An inopportune question: regardless of the fact that MTK was not a cleaning company, what was its true nature? Hadn’t it organised the violent demonstrations contesting the result of the first round of the election and obtaining its reversal? With its hand on its heart (and its chequebook), USAID simply replied: "The Tet Kale Movement is not the same as the Tet Kale Party" – Martelly's party, which would not see the light of day until 2012, a year after the inauguration and the donation. The unexpurgated explanation: in Haiti, politicians build movements to gain power and then transform them into parties. No formation or party opposed to Martelly benefited from any financial support at the same time.

Since we're in Haiti, let's stay there for a moment.

In May 1991, the U.S. Congress authorised USAID to allocate $24.5 million over four years to a Democracy Strengthening Project. The objective (in the presentable version) was to strengthen "local governments and independent organisations," but above all (in the unauthorised version) to support conservative organisations capable of acting as an "institutional counterweight" to left-wing President Jean-Bertrand Aristide. By the greatest of coincidences, Aristide was overthrown in a military coup that year. While the "Democracy Strengthening Project" was suspended, having clearly outlived its usefulness, some of its elements, notably support for the most conservative unions, remained active throughout the coup government. [20]

Bis repetita placent: according to Democratic U.S. Senator Christopher Dodd, USAID spent $1.2 million to train and equip with 20,000 M-16 rifles the "rebels" who, in 2004, overthrew Aristide for a second time.

On January 12, 2010, and in the following days, a magnitude 7 earthquake struck Haiti. Terrifying: 280,000 dead, 300,000 injured, and more than a million homeless.

Heads: USAID immediately deployed its elite Disaster Assistance Response Team (DART). Comprising 545 personnel and 34 experts, it was the largest response team ever deployed by the Agency. With 130 people rescued, it did an admirable job. USAID also provided emergency food aid to nearly four million people; Daily drinking water for 1.3 million people; and, in partnership with other international donors, basic shelter for 1.5 million Haitians.

On the flip side: From January 2010 to April 2011, the U.S. government signed 1,490 contracts totalling $194 million for reconstruction. Of these contracts, only 23 benefited Haitian companies, amounting to $4.8 million (2.5%) [21]; a third of the funds released returned to the United States. Of the top ten recipients of USAID funding, the two largest were Chemonics and Development Alternatives Incorporated (Dai). After 2016, the two institutions still received over 40% of all contract funding.

With 6,000 employees, Chemonics is the largest company in the host of USAID intermediaries, contractors, and subcontractors—Creative Associates International, Navanti, DevTech Systems, Dexis, Research and Exchange Board (IREX), etc. But the United States' "philanthropic" work doesn't only pass through USAID. More discreet because it's more controversial, the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), a CIA substitute, also channels grants abroad. To distribute the manna, USAID and NED rely on the veritable branches of the National Democratic Institute (NDI) and the International Republican Institute (IRI), organisations of the US "establishment." Around it gravitate a multitude of satellites: Freedom House, Open Society Foundations (owned by banker George Soros), Solidarity Center, Center for International Private Enterprise (CIPE), Consortium for Elections and Political Process Strengthening (CEPPS), and so on.

We will try here to focus on the role of USAID, even though all these agencies often work in highly intertwined ways.

When thinking of US aggression against a Latin American nation, Cuba immediately comes to mind. However, this is a special case in that the blockade in place for sixty years prevents USAID from officially operating on the island or the direct flow of resources as used in other countries. This in no way prevents interference in which, for decades, USAID was not the centrepiece, with the CIA directing operations almost unmasked.

In 1995, as a Democrat keen to maintain appearances, Bill Clinton ordered USAID to create a "pro-democracy" program for Cuba. More than $6 million was allocated to financing "dissident" groups and introducing technical resources into Cuban territory—computers, digital printing, telecommunications, fax, and video equipment.

With the arrival of George W. Bush, the greenback fever intensified. A fever, yes. And a hell of a fever. Between 2001 and 2006, a flood of $61 million fuelled the blossoming of 142 "projects" and activities illegal under Cuban law; $120 million followed between 2007 and 2013 for 215 "projects"—including $1.5 million to strengthen the Cuban "media ecosystem" so dear to RSF.

In 2009, a major blow for USAID, which does not dislike a certain discretion: the Cuban authorities arrested one of its contractors, Alan Gross, in Havana while he was distributing computers and satellite transmission equipment to anti-Castro elements in the Jewish community. Sentenced to fifteen years in prison, Gross was released in December 2014, as part of a prisoner exchange [22]. Imagination nonetheless remains in power in the bowels of US subversion. That same year, 2014, it was discovered that, recruited by USAID (and paid by Creative Associates International), a dozen young Venezuelans, Costa Ricans, and Peruvians had posed as tourists in Havana and Santa Clara, tasked with "identifying social actors likely to drive social change" on the island. A little earlier, Aldo y los Aldeanos, a rap group critical of the government, had been recruited through music promoters. The goal: to use the hip-hop movement to "help Cuban youth break the information blockade."

Between 2010 and 2012, thousands of Cubans used ZunZuneo, a sort of local Twitter, unaware that it had been designed by USAID—"without any ulterior motive," the American authorities would point out with the utmost seriousness. The first stage of this program, launched from a shell company in Spain with funds hidden in the Cayman Islands, aimed to build a "critical" user base by disseminating general content, particularly sports and cultural content. Once this objective was achieved, more political content was to be introduced in order to generate mobilisations and, if possible, trigger a "color revolution." With a budget of $1.6 million, the project was ultimately abandoned after two years of existence, having failed to reach the 200,000 users initially hoped for.

USAID will continue to play a key role in 2021. The US embargo, the loss of economic support from Venezuela (itself attacked and weakened), and the desertion of tourists due to Covid-19 are exacerbating the economic difficulties. Exhausted by food and medicine shortages, and exasperated by power outages, thousands of Cubans will eventually take to the streets. From Washington, USAID is already fanning the flames. Increasingly passionate about tropical music, it has withdrawn $2 million from its coffers to subsidise the orchestra accompanying future events. She would later boast, explaining that, thanks to her, "artists and musicians took to the streets to protest government repression, producing anthems like 'Patria y Vida,' which not only raised global awareness of the plight of the Cuban people, but also served as a rallying cry for change on the island."

According to Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez, USAID showered dozens of organisations involved in destabilising the island with more than $120 million. On X (February 14, 2025), President Miguel Díaz-Canel protested: "The U.S. government and the tabloid press are alarmed by the millions of dollars USAID spends on subversion and funding supposedly independent media and NGOs, even though we have been denouncing this for years!"

But, by the way... What about non-governmental organisations funded by USAID? A vast and delicate subject. In the wake of the earthquake affecting US cooperation, we are surprisingly discovering that major French NGOs are affected: Solidarités International (36% of whose budget depended on USAID), Action Against Hunger (30%), and surely others, which we may discover tomorrow. We will not a priori make any judgments about these institutions. Nor will we dispute the relevance of NGOs when they tackle problems such as the debt of poor countries, world hunger, land grabbing, tax havens, the defense of sexual minorities, access to education and health for all, and the reception of refugees or migrants. Who would blame medical relief organisations, in contexts of armed conflict or disasters of all kinds, for alleviating the suffering of populations? Who could forget the NGOs opposed to neoliberal globalisation, capable of mobilising over 100,000 participants at the Mumbai Social Forum in 2004?

However, seen from another angle...

"From the aforementioned NGO network," denounced former Honduran President Manuel Zelaya in 2021, overthrown in a pro-American coup in 2009, and referring to neighbouring Nicaragua, "hundreds of organisations stand out that saturate the political life of society, creating a sort of parallel state driven by major media outlets and networks, which artificially become protagonists, attempting to undermine the progress of progressive governments or prevent the rise to power of left-wing political projects demanding the participation of society and the state against the deception of the market" [23]. »

"Development aid can only succeed if it is sustainably based on democratic reforms and assistance to reformist forces over a long period, perhaps decades," theorised USAID [24]. By "reformist forces," we mean trends that do not endanger capitalism and its beneficiaries. To this end, the Agency serves as a cash register for a myriad of NGOs with highly laudable interests, such as those mentioned above. Very well. But what else?

In most cases, since 1990, neoliberal governments have turned to them to provide the services they should be providing—health, education, culture—and which they have deliberately abandoned either to nothing or to the market.

The leaders of these NGOs are not elected, but appointed by small groups of individuals. Large or small, once they have established a presence, these organisations must secure their own funding. They end up resembling traditional businesses, with quantified objectives, staff, and profitability calculations. In addition to citizens being asked to be generous, powerful patrons are opening their wallets. USAID, for example. Whether they like it or not, NGOs find themselves bound by the money they accept. Adherence to the principles and values ​​of the generous donor happens automatically, or gradually, or insidiously. This is despite the fact that "philanthropic" actions and the resources to carry them out go hand in hand. We suddenly realise this when Trump, like a bull in a china shop, sets all of Geneva in turmoil. The withdrawal of USAID funds has made the Swiss city now too expensive for the finances of some of the 38 international organisations that have established themselves there and spend nearly $7 billion a year supporting 400 NGOs. With many of the 29,000 jobs linked to this "business" under threat, the city had to approve a budget of 2 million Swiss francs to support the "humanitarians" in peril. When will there be a caravan from Doctors Without Borders or Doctors of the World to collect the wounded and survivors? Tough. But still... Behind the loudly proclaimed self-sacrifice, considerable sums in operating costs clearly allow a world of human rights and development professionals to live above reasonable means.

While putting Band-Aids on the world's misery, NGOs nonetheless avoid discussing with their protégés the political causes of the problems they face. Not necessarily out of cynicism or acceptance, but for the reasons previously explained. What we call the recognition of the gut; or the concept of "necessity is law." Even if they are peaceful, USAID is not in the business of financing radical social transformations or revolutions. It has its own agenda. When it is present on the ground, behind the smiles shedding a glow of brotherly love, there is occasionally hidden the camaraderie of the wolf and the lamb. In addition to civil servants and contractors engaged in their mission out of humanist conviction, less selfless Good Samaritans penetrate civil society, work on it ideologically, observe it, gather what is called "human intelligence," and transmit to "whom it may concern" the information gathered on local activists, influential leaders, protest groups, and committed intellectuals. This activity is also practiced, without official cover (SCO, in the jargon), in the heart of sensitive regions, by occasional or professional spies operating in the shadows of thousands of NGO employees.

In Haiti, after the 2010 earthquake, there was open talk of the Republic of NGOs. Their number was then estimated at... 10,000. Almost as many as in India, a country of 1.438 billion inhabitants! The day after the earthquake, in the conference room of the Karibe Hotel, several dozen people were working on the "Post Disaster Needs Assessment" (PDNA), a document to be presented at United Nations headquarters. More than 80% of the drafters were "blan" (foreigners). Like flies, the heads of numerous international organisations hovered around them to ensure their projects were incorporated into this plan [25]. "Business" above all: what some saw as a veritable Marshall Plan would generate very large budgets.

Later, when the time came to take stock, Haiti would still be just as poor and underdeveloped.

Without generalising such a caricatured situation, these myriad NGOs, each with its own agenda in health, education, agriculture, development, the environment, and governance, constituted states within a state. Bypassed, weakened. Maintained (often with its consent) in absolute dependence.

In its own right, USAID takes a particular interest in NGOs artificially created to address "causes" whose apparent defense can benefit dominant powers, starting with the United States. It is well known that these "humanitarians" saturate the media space of the collective West. And that the information they disseminate circulates in a circular manner with UN agencies.

Is this assessment too harsh, unfair, tainted by bad faith or ideology? "Por favoooor!" Contribution to the debate by US Secretary of State Colin Powell, October 26, 2001: "As surely as our diplomats and our military, American NGOs are out there, serving and sacrificing themselves on the front lines of freedom. […] I am serious about ensuring that we have the best possible relationships with the NGOs that are a force multiplier for us, such an important part of our fighting team."

Ecuador, 2007-2017. President Rafael Correa is a dangerous individual. New Constitution, significant social reforms. Significant reduction in poverty. Considers communication a public service. Prohibits a financial institution from holding more than 6% of the capital of a press organisation. Will attempt to redistribute media space: one-third of the radio spectrum for the private sector, one-third for the public sector, and one-third for the non-profit sector. Maintains friendly relations with Fidel Castro, Hugo Chávez, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, Néstor and then Cristina Kirchner, Evo Morales, the gang of "magnificent illuminati" who are changing the face of the subcontinent.

Reasonable estimates put the proportion of indigenous Ecuadorians at around 25% of the population. In the 1990s, based on identity-based, class-based, and anti-imperialist demands, the Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador (Conaie) led two massive uprisings. Having become the national reference for opposition to traditional elites, the movement acquired a political arm, Pachakutik (PK).

At this moment, an armada of NGOs flooded into Ecuador. Some, full of goodwill, came from Europe, with no real understanding of the country's reality. Others were funded by USAID (and/or the NED). "They don't come to support social struggles," Eduardo Meneses, an expert on social movements, explained to us in Quito in 2023. "They arrive, for example, to donate $10,000 to a small local agroecology project." To do this, they only needed a few "educated" people. "They took the only young person in a village capable of writing a report and, without any political training, without organisational skills, but an indispensable link with generous foreign benefactors, he became a new community leader." A generational divide, the entire history of the indigenous movement, all the strong ideological training of the 1970s and 1980s, faded, disappeared.

At the same time, Pachakutik was infiltrated by NGOs that in no way reflected CONAIE's original objectives. Many PK leaders set up foundations brimming with government subsidies (United States, European Union), in conjunction with these notorious NGOs.

As early as 2010, Correa had to confront a "police revolt" that closely resembled a coup d'état. PK's indigenous leaders participated directly in the rebellion, including the "ultra" Lourdes Tibán. USAID subsidised the Indigenous Employers' Corporation of Ecuador (CEIE), of which Tibán was a prominent member. The same generous donor funded Citizen Participation, another organisation hostile to the Citizen Revolution.

To finance social programs, Correa relied, among other things, on the development of mining activity. It was time for Chemonics to emerge. The company urgently allocated $5.4 million from USAID for a "Sustainable Coasts and Forests" program. This was a seamless intrusion with obvious effects. In June 2011, Correa denounced the fact that these foreign NGOs were working with indigenous populations on the Colombian border to "play politics, generate chaos," and destabilise his government. As a result, on July 5, Executive Order 812 was adopted, requiring these NGOs to disclose the origin and use of the millions of dollars they spend, to report their annual programs and financial reports, the relevance of their work to the national plan for "good living" ("Buen Vivir"), the territories where they operate, and the social actors with whom they work.

Refusing to comply with the law, the US environmental NGO Conservation International (CI) was expelled from the country. Scandalous! Alerted, alarmed, and disconnected from the real context, the European left and far left are beginning to denounce Correa's "authoritarianism," which is also "anti-ecological." Only (or almost only) journalist Eduardo Tamayo of the Latin American News Agency (ALAI) raises eyebrows: in addition to USAID, CI counts among its partners and donors transnational corporations such as Rio Tinto, Ford, Monsanto, Intel, Coca-Cola, Starbucks, Walmart, Walt Disney, McDonald's, and... the second-largest oil company in the United States, Chevron [26]. Did you say nature conservation?

The Pachamama Foundation went so far in its relentless attacks on Correa, in the name of a maximalist "anti-extractivism" (for such a thing can be reasonable and reasoned), that it was itself expelled from the country in 2013. At that time, for those willing to open their eyes, USAID's strategy was perfectly clear. That same year, 2013, it injected $16 million into Ecuador, again through Chemonics, into initiatives on the topic of "environmental protection," a pressing issue for young Ecuadorians and the "international community." [27]

Although presenting themselves as "apolitical" and representing "civil society," many of these partner NGOs, whether in Ecuador or elsewhere, actually function as de facto political parties and conduits for political agendas designed to destabilise the government(s).

Since 2012, as a result, the progressive countries of the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America (ALBA) have been seriously considering expelling USAID from their territories [28]. In May 2013, Bolivian President Evo Morales took action, accusing the Agency of acting "not for social but for political ends," driven by "a desire for submission and a mentality of domination."

In 1930, there were about ten NGOs in Bolivia; in 1980, there were around 200; in 2000, just over 600, the vast majority of them national. In January 2006, with Evo Morales, the Movement Toward Socialism (MAS) came to power. From 2007 to 2019—the year in which, re-elected, Morales was overthrown in a coup d'état—the number of these NGOs will triple (only 667 are officially registered) [29]. Even though the social situation is improving considerably, a hundred of these NGOs are positioning themselves more or less openly in line with the opposition. Like a vulture more than a condor, USAID hovers over the highlands and the hot regions, very hostile to the power of the "Media Luna" ("half-moon"). From 2002, while the left was gaining power, the US Agency invested more than 97 million dollars in projects of "decentralisation" and "regional autonomy" - the hobbyhorses, precisely, of the regional putschist governments of the "Media Luna". In 2008, it was on the basis of this type of demand that these white "elites" attempted to overthrow the head of the indigenous state. In 2005 and 2006, 75% of USAID resources were directed to their violent separatist groups.

With collusion as obvious as the nose on one's face, Morales expelled U.S. Ambassador Philip Goldberg on September 10, 2008, whose expertise in separatism had been honed during his previous diplomatic missions in Bosnia and Kosovo. On November 1, it was the turn of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA), also accused of supporting the uprising, to leave the country. USAID, as we have seen, suffered the same fate in May 2013. While its officials packed their bags, it nonetheless maintained funding for its cronies from Washington. Two years later, when he challenged four so-called environmental NGOs that it sponsored – Milenio, CEDIB, Fundación Tierra and CEDLA – Vice President Álvaro García Linera declared: “We cannot allow any foreign government, company or foreign paragovernmental organisation to define the public policies of the Plurinational State of Bolivia. Otherwise, we would be submitting to neocolonialism.”

In 2013, along with the Pachamama Foundation, Rafael Correa expelled seven of the 180 NGOs officially present in Ecuador. Funded from abroad (Italy, Holland, and Spain), they had refused to provide information on their activities. "The official cooperation of other governments must complement the political project legitimately voted for at the ballot box," the government announced on that occasion. This didn't prevent Amnesty International from issuing a statement denouncing the closure of the Pachamama Foundation and didn't seem to bother USAID, whose "Strengthening Democracy" program continued to provide wads of money to various forms of opposition.

Criminalised in Bolivia, the Agency was also implicated in Venezuela, where its Office of Transition Initiatives (OTI) was leading an obvious regime-change operation. Correa took note. Believing that national sovereignty was being affected, he froze relations with USAID in December and withdrew it from the country in 2014.

It was game over – until next time!

A former vice president under Correa, elected on April 2, 2017, on the platform of the Citizens' Revolution, Lenín Moreno betrayed his voters and his campaign promises. He was a Trumpian before his time: 160,000 public sector workers received their dismissal letters. In 2018, co-governing with the most pro-American right, Moreno authorised USAID to resume its activities in the country.

Having become too unpopular due to his catastrophic management, Moreno cannot run again in the 2021 presidential election. Opposing the "Correista" Andrés Arauz are the banker Guillermo Lasso and the Pachakutik candidate Carlos Arnulfo Pérez Guartambel – known as "Yaku Pérez". A "left-wing eco-indigenous", radically opposed to the "developmentalist" policies of Correa and his potential successors, Pérez is a true "son of an NGO". Even if he is openly pro-Yankee, his position – "defender of the right to water, opposed to mining" – arouses interest and sympathy (especially abroad). Coming in third place in the first round (19.39% of the vote), behind Arauz (who came in first with 32.72% of the vote) and Lasso (19.74%), he will rely on the quarter-century of USAID's co-optation of environmental and indigenous groups to defeat the left-wing candidate. While Pérez allows his voters to vote freely in the second round, the Conaie (Conseil d'Etat) has declared an "ideological null vote." This allows the banker to win.

For roughly the same reasons, in the second round of the early presidential election on October 15, 2023, the indigenous and "green" "Sierra" will vote overwhelmingly for the son of a multimillionaire banana magnate, Daniel Noboa. The left-wing candidate Luisa González (Citizen Revolution; RC) had nevertheless won the first round with 33.61% of the vote.

Neck and neck in the first round of the presidential election on February 9, 2025, the same two will meet again in the second round on April 13. The successive neoliberal policies of Moreno, Lasso, and then Noboa having plunged the country into a situation that went from calamitous to catastrophic, leader Guillermo Churuchumbi marked a break by signing a pact on March 30, granting Pachakutik's support to Luisa González. Mathematically, the "Correismo" candidate should therefore win. However, strong internal tensions are agitating the indigenous movement, whose faction influenced by the "USAID-NGO" complex is crying treason and suggesting an indecisive result.

Let's not go back to the CIA's aggression against Nicaragua during the 1980s. Defeated by the consequences of the war, the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) lost the February 1990 presidential election. With a strong democratic leaning, it ceded power to the new head of state, Violetta Chamorro. Sixteen long years of neoliberal governments destroyed all social gains. Between those who refused to eat less and those who wanted to eat too much, the contradictions became more acute. The November 2006 presidential election loomed. For those in power, it became increasingly uncertain whether Nicaraguans would vote "right."

Throughout 2006, USAID woke up and invested the staggering sum of $260 million in the country. Intended for infrastructure, transportation, and rural development projects, the majority of the spoils went through the Washington-based Millennium Challenge Corporation.

Despite this significant and altruistic effort, the outcasts broke the rules of decorum and elected the Sandinista Daniel Ortega. Development was no longer on the agenda: USAID reduced its contribution to $45 million in 2009 and to $34 million in 2012. A privileged partner received what was still a substantial windfall and redistributed part of it: the Chamorro Foundation. Cristina Chamorro, daughter of the former president, headed the institution.

Beginning in 2009, a substantial portion of the effort was focused on a program called "Vital Voices Nicaragua." First Lady Hillary Clinton and Secretary of State Madeleine Albright participated in the venture by endorsing it. Under the guise of supporting "women leaders," the program promotes women likely to play a leading role in countries where Washington would welcome either the continuation of neoliberal policies or regime change. This is an eminently political-economic project, with feminism and empowerment as a smokescreen. In 2017, a crucial year, as we will see later, "Vital Voices Nicaragua" will be allocated $2,071,639.

To each his own: while USAID offers grist to the mill, Sandinismo is giving us a hard time. Far from weakening, it is strengthening, driven by the effectiveness of its social programs. However, if we wait until a smooth change is possible, the story risks dragging on for too long. USAID is back on the offensive and making millions dance. Between 2010 and 2020, it will distribute $84 million to destabilise Daniel Ortega's government. Several objectives (the same, it should be noted, as in all the target countries): strengthen the opposition and train new leaders; format the instruments necessary for media warfare; work on vulnerable sectors of society; and create a critical mass of citizens capable of turning against the government in the event of severe tensions. With particular emphasis on Nicaragua, the Caribbean coast, a region home to indigenous minorities—Miskito, Sumu, and Rama—deemed a priority by the U.S. State Department [30].

From then on, as the website Behind Back Doors revealed at the time, a multitude of programs would be implemented, successively, intertwined, and complementary to bring down the Central American rebel country [31].

Institutional Strengthening Program: Improving the mobilisation capacity of opposition organisations (Dexis Consulting Group and Chemonics; $8.99 million).

Civil Society Grants Program: Reactivation and training of organisations tasked with discrediting electoral processes and exposing alleged corruption by government institutions (Ethics and Transparency; $1.98 million between 2013 and 2018).

Democratic Leadership Development Program: Targeted at youth with a view to generational renewal within the opposition (National Democratic Institute; $19.65 million).

Promotion of Economic and Social Development in Nicaragua: Promoting the national and international image of the Nicaraguan NGO Fundides (Nicaraguan Foundation for Economic and Social Development), which is tasked with dismantling the government's economic policy in its reports ($2.50 million between 2011 and 2016).

Caribbean Coast (A Quality Technical Education for the Caribbean Coast; Community Action for Reading and Security; Education for Success; Technical Vocational Education and Training Strengthening for At-Risk Youth (TVET SAY): a set of programs designed to create community-based anti-power sentiment by stirring up past conflicts and training leaders (total $46.4 million).

Local Governance (Local Governance Program): strengthening anti-Sandinista forces in local authorities to weaken the central government; challenging infrastructure projects—starting with the interoceanic canal project to compete with the Panama Canal, planned between 2010 and 2015 (Global Communities; $29 million over the period 2016-2018).

Capacity Building for Civil Society Defense: When this program ended in 2018, USAID boasted of having created 126 "alliances and associations" and supported 224 civil society organisations (Dexis/Chemonics; budget unknown).

The Media Strengthening Program established in 2014 by USAID and the Chamorro Foundation planned for the latter to oversee the modest sum of $9.4 million made available. Charity begins at home, "Queen Cristina" subsidised La Prensa, the digital media outlet Confidencial, and the think tank Funides, owned by the Chamorro family, then a myriad of media outlets, each more "ultra" than the last—100% Noticias, Artículo 66, Nicaragua Investiga, Nicaragua Actual, BacanalNica, Despacho 505; the television channels Canal 10, Canal 11, Canal 12, and Vos TV; Radio Corporación and Radio Café con Voz. Through other channels, the Center for Communication Research (CINCO) raised $3.24 million, Hagamos Democracy $1.11 million, the Fundación Popol Na $207,762, and Movimiento por Nicaragua $803,154 [32]…

The rest is well known (or should be).

A crowd can only be brought into the streets once it has been primed and carefully managed. Attacking from all angles, it was this ecosystem with its supposedly invisible conductor that prepared public opinion (including international opinion) for the April 2018 uprising. It chose the leaders. It trained them. It organised them.

The clashes between the Nicaraguan right and armed thugs on one side, and the police and then Sandinista groups mobilised against the attempted overthrow of Ortega on the other, took on the appearance of a civil war. During the events, the propaganda machines were in full swing. Later portrayed as persecuted by an authoritarian regime, 100% Noticias and other Hagamos Democracia newspapers openly called on the opposition to engage in hatred, violence, to take up arms, and to carry out a coup d'état. They invoked a US military intervention, similar to the one carried out in Panama in 1989. The ultra-violent groups were able to count on the necessary funding for their deployment.

All had their share of deaths and tears. According to the Report of the National Assembly's Truth Commission (February 2019), 253 people were killed – 31 undisputed opposition supporters, 48 ​​proven or probable Sandinistas, 22 members of the security forces (victims of firearms, as well as 401 injured police officers), and 152 victims whose affiliation could not be determined.

At this point, a particularly pernicious aspect of "Made in the US" destabilisation (generally accompanied in the background by the European Union's satellite countries) comes into play: the instrumentalisation of human rights defense. In this field, NGOs are multiplying like mushrooms in the autumn rain. All they need is a head office and a phone number to exist. Then, they can denounce the "atrocities" of the power that must be brought down. They rely on the sector's major multinationals—Amnesty International (AI), Human Rights Watch (HRW), and the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH)—to relay the "information" and provoke outrage, and then, if possible, a reaction from the "international community." With one absolute principle: only states and their representatives can be blamed. As long as they are part of "civil society," a concept that could not be more vague, putschists, violent individuals, or murderers who are neutralised or imprisoned become "victims of repression" or "political prisoners." A vision, all in all, very "libertarian" of politics and social life.

There are three leaders in Nicaragua in this area: the Permanent Commission on Human Rights (CPDH), the Nicaraguan Pro-Human Rights Association (ANPDH), and the Nicaraguan Center for Human Rights (Cenidh). The latter two engaged in a fascinating competition. Cenidh announced 302 deaths, but was beaten by the ANPDH, which was able to count 560 at the end of the conflict. Amnesty tentatively settled on the figure of 322, "the majority in the hands of state agents." This was a bit too soft for the so-called "mainstream" media, which preferred to follow the ANPDH (La Croix, Le Point, CNN in Spanish, El País, etc.). In an article dated January 3, the "very serious" daily Le Monde again put forward the fanciful figure of "at least 350 deaths" (as if 253 weren't enough!) [33].

In a sector where it is important to act tactfully so as not to expose it to criticism, it is not USAID that is on the front line, but NED, its discreet little sister. In 2018 alone, the latter granted $180,000 to the CPDH [34]. On July 23, 2019, in Managua, at a press conference, three ANPDH executives – Gustavo Bermúdez, Francisco Lanzas, and German Herrera – denounced their director, Álvaro Leiva, accusing him of having "swiped" $500,000 from Costa Rica, where he had gone into exile, including more than $100,000 allocated by the NED in 2017 and 2018. They also revealed that in 2018, the ANPDH artificially inflated the number of deaths and injuries to receive more funding from the United States.

At the end of the chain, whether in development or in the defense of human rights, is the UN. Article 71 of the United Nations Charter defines the existence of NGOs and allows them to participate in some of its activities: "The Economic and Social Council [ECOSOC] may take all appropriate steps to consult with non-governmental organisations concerned with matters within its competence." Present in several of the 25 ECOSOC commissions, 6,500 NGOs with registered status have become major players in UN international conferences.

An integral part of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), the Human Rights Committee (HRC) [35] welcomes observers during its sessions—non-member states, intergovernmental organisations, national human rights institutions, and NGOs. These NGOs may, among other things, submit a written statement; make an oral statement; or participate in debates, interactive dialogues, roundtables, and informal meetings. They can also organise side events on issues related to the work of the Human Rights Council (HRC) – a subsidiary body of the UN General Assembly (from which Donald Trump's United States withdrew).

So…

USAID (or the NED, or George Soros, or even the European Union) funds (not all) so-called human rights NGOs. These NGOs provide "denunciations" to the "respectably known" institutions in the sector – Amnesty International (AI), Human Rights Watch (HRW), FIDH, etc. All of these accusations feed the media and/or UN bodies – not to mention the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), which is part of the Organization of American States (OAS). All of these bodies, in turn, prepare reports. One of the strengths of all these bodies lies in the moral authority they enjoy. From then on, the circle is complete: USAID/NED; Local NGOs; global NGOs; media; UN influenced by local and global NGOs; global NGOs echoing UN findings; media apparatus conflating everything. Public opinion confused.

Whether HRW criticises Trump or illiberal leaders like him changes nothing: the NGO is, by definition and has always been, much closer to the Democratic Party than to the Republican Party.

The fact that AI takes courageous positions on Israel, Gaza, or this or that situation does not prevent its culpable wanderings on other subjects. Take the case of Venezuela, for example. Two particularly important sources: the Foro Penal (an openly opposition organisation) and Provea. In other times (the 1980s), Provea defended left-wing activists who were victims of repression. For those who haven't noticed: several decades have passed. Its leaders are no longer the same. The organisation has evolved. Since 2015, Venezuela has been the victim of more than 900 unilateral coercive measures imposed by the United States. This set of sanctions has brought the country's economy to its knees and caused immense social suffering. What does Rafael Uzcátegui, former head of Provea and recently a researcher at the Washington Office of Latin American Affairs (WOLA), say about this? "It is false to claim that lifting sanctions will improve the quality of life of Venezuelans. The money will be wasted on the cannibalistic corruption that reigns within Chavismo and will not reach the population [36]." Translation: yes to coercive measures. The discourse of the Venezuelan far-right and the reactionary International (Trump, Javier Milei, Jair Bolsonaro, etc.)...

Bolivia: Under the leadership of its long-time leader, a former Spanish nun, María Amparo Carvajal, the Permanent Assembly of Human Rights of Bolivia (APDHB) supported the coup d'état against Evo Morales in November 2019 and defended the police and army members involved in the violence that left 37 dead and 800 injured. HRW denounced Morales and, rather than "coup d'état," referred to a "political vendetta." The FIDH reiterated the APDHB's statements without any reservation.

In an article by… VOA [37], Carvajal will be praised when, on December 10, 2024, she receives the Human Rights Defender Award from Antony Blinken, awarded by the U.S. State Department.

The above is in no way an attack on the necessary defense of human rights, nor a fig leaf intended to conceal repression, torture, the death penalty, and other degrading treatment. It is simply an observation. By exploiting their instrumentalisation too much, certain actors risk discouraging citizens who feel concerned by the cause and permanently discrediting it.

Back to our starting point. In Nicaragua, the attempt to overthrow Sandinismo in 2018 ultimately resulted in a resounding "pssschiiiit". In anticipation of the 2021 presidential election, USAID reinjected $2 million into "Responsive Assistance in Nicaragua" (RAIN) intended to prevent Ortega's re-election. Another failure. The Sandinista was re-elected. The program was therefore increased to $5 million through 2024. Now, there is a stumbling block: since 2021, many USAID partner NGOs have closed, either voluntarily or under duress for failing to comply with Law 1040, known as the "Foreign Agents Regulation Act," which is more or less similar to the one Correa passed in Ecuador or the Foreign Agent Registration Act (FARA) in force in the United States. Without being accused by anyone of being tyrannical, this FARA requires that individuals acting as agents of foreign principals "periodically disclose to the public their relationship with the foreign principal, as well as the activities, receipts, and disbursements in support of those activities." The main objective is to promote "transparency regarding foreign influence in the United States."

Since then, total obscurity has descended over the Agency's interference in Nicaragua. The only thing that is known is that numerous radical opposition leaders have been arrested—for refusing to comply with the law (a fact that is rarely made clear).

Fasten your seatbelts, we're entering another turbulent zone: between 2001 and 2024, according to the US Office of Foreign Assistance, the United States channeled $1.27 billion to Venezuela; 86.95% of these resources, or $1.10 billion, were managed by USAID.

Here are the facts: since February 2, 1999, Hugo Chávez has governed the country, which became the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela. Neoliberalism is seeing its ideological hold challenged. Who will benefit from the enormous oil reserves? The largest on the planet! The Oval Office and the State Department are trembling. On the ground, the upper and middle classes are also stubbornly resisting change. In 2001, USAID allocated Venezuela the paltry sum of $4,100. It jumped to over $2 million the following year as the protests of spoiled children multiplied. In March 2002, USAID (and the NED) created an Office of Transition Initiatives (OTI) in Caracas. A month later, on April 11, the coup d'état attempted to eliminate Chávez and failed. Coincidence? No-no-no! The word "transition" says it all. As proof: the money started flowing freely.

The OTI? The artist explained on the evening of the opening: it is a tool intended to repaint a "populist" regime into a "US-compatible democracy." According to a 2006 US embassy cable revealed by Wikileaks in 2013, it is also (and more prosaically) about: protecting vital US interests; infiltrate and divide the political base of Chavismo; isolate the Bolivarian head of state internationally. Between 2002 and 2010, the OTI channeled $26 million to 300 organisations ranging from the media to political parties, including unions and NGOs. This is only talking about the OTI. USAID's total good works amount to $57 million [38]. It is important to be careful with the figures: in August 2006, the Los Angeles Times stated that the OTI had sent more than $220 million since 2002 [39]. What is certain is that a myriad of NGOs are emerging that will soon dominate the scene: Súmate (owned by a certain María Corina Machado), Ciudadanía Activa, Voto Joven, Sinergia, Cedice, Radar de los Barrios, Espacio Público, etc. A common characteristic: they don't mince their words. Their newsletters read like CIA press releases. For those who haven't figured it out, Venezuelan sociologist Gladys Rojas sheds light on the phenomenon by pointing out that a large number of NGOs are used by the right to circumvent legal norms: "Since political parties cannot receive funding from private entities or foreign governments, opposition parties created these NGOs to serve as their financial arm, receiving this support [40]."

Wikileaks again! Dated June 15, 2007, a cable from the United States ambassador in Caracas reports a discreet meeting with "partners" within the embassy. The meeting was attended by "Special Coordinator for Venezuela" Deborah McCarthy and thirteen prominent "human rights defenders," including Carlos Ayala (Andean Commission of Jurists), Carlos Correa (Espacio Público), José Gregorio Guarenas (Catholic Vicariate for Human Rights), Liliana Ortega (Cofavic), Rocio San Miguel (Citizen Control) [41], and Andrés Canizalez, a journalist and contributor to Reporters Without Borders.

Being anything but naive, Chávez eventually lost patience and ordered the expulsion of the OTI in September 2010.

Sorry for the avalanche of figures that follows, tedious to read, but even more unpleasant for those affected by them. Nicolás Maduro replaced the late Chávez. At cruising speed, between 2013 and 2016, USAID poured around $4 million per year into his Venezuelan protégés. A significant increase in 2017: of the $14 million allocated by the US government, $6.5 million (including $3.9 million for the "governance and civil society" sector) came from USAID. Money, it should be noted, also flows to the foreign perpetrators of the aggression against Caracas: an "independent" entity affiliated with the Organization of American States (OAS), headed by US crony Luis Almagro, the Pan American Development Foundation (PADF) receives $1.6 million, of which it allocates $950,000 to the "Strengthening Civil Society, Venezuela Participation Project" program. It is unclear what it does with the rest. What we do know, however, is that it is co-financed by the multinationals Merck and Chevron.

The result: for four long months—from April to July 2017—as barricades multiplied, the counterrevolution went on the offensive, burning and destroying public buildings, hospitals, health centres, daycare centres, schools, high schools, maternity wards, food and medicine warehouses, and more. One hundred and twenty-five deaths, thousands of injuries, and millions of dollars in losses.

When it comes to international law, the only rules that apply in Washington are not those of the United Nations Charter, but the executive orders signed in the Oval Office by the President. On March 9, 2015, Barack Obama declared Venezuela "an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security of the United States." This opened the door to what was to follow: a deluge of unilateral coercive measures intended to bring the Bolivarian Republic to its knees. The economic war began. The country suffered, faltered, and plunged into crisis. Then...

On January 23, 2019, a small-time politician, Popular Will (VP) MP Juan Guaidó, proclaimed himself "interim president." As early as October 2019, USAID Administrator Mark Green announced that the partnership agreement with Guaidó’s team was “official”: “His government is the only government representing the interests of the Venezuelan people, and we are very proud to work with them.” The funds disbursed will be used “to pay their salaries, airfare, training for good governance, propaganda, technical assistance to organise elections, and other democracy-building projects.” USAID is disbursing everything: $98 million in 2019 (we’re rounding up); $155 million in 2020; $180 million in 2021; $207 million in 2022; $206 million in 2023, and $211 million in 2024 (the highest amount in two decades).

“February 23 [2019] will be the day humanitarian aid enters Venezuela,” Guaido challenged earlier this month. “It will enter Venezuela, that’s for sure, and the usurper will have no choice but to leave Venezuela!” The brilliant idea: Maduro having “starved his compatriots,” a “humanitarian” operation carried out from Cúcuta, the main Colombian city on the border, will both allow for a formidable media spectacle and demonstrate the support of the “international community” for Maduro’s departure. Which community, in fact, is not paying much attention to the reaction of Foreign Minister Jorge Arreaza during a press conference at UN headquarters: "There is no humanitarian crisis in Venezuela, there is a blocked and besieged economy," he declared before denouncing the United States' double standards: "It's a hostile government that kills you on one side and feeds you on the other!" Without necessarily realising it, he has succinctly summarised the entire action of USAID.

When approached, the International Red Cross refused to participate in the farce. The director of its Colombian branch, Christoph Harnisch, disputes the term "humanitarian aid," considering it violates the principles of neutrality and impartiality. In fact, in the days leading up to the deadline, three enormous military C-17s will take off from Homestead Air Force Base in Miami for a landing in Cúcuta. The first aircraft will carry 70 tons of aid; the next two, 230 tons in total. Since January, USAID has mobilised $2 million to transport these supplies and commodities to this country, but also, for a total of 368 tons, to Brazil and the Caribbean island of Curaçao. Along with U.S. Ambassador Kevin Whitaker, senior Colombian officials, and Guaidó's cronies (who will arrive a little later, aided by the narco-paramilitary group "Rastrojos"), USAID's "boss," Mark Green, himself, will be overseeing the preparations and answering questions from the press in Cúcuta.

All this is well and good, but it's leading nowhere. Supposed to have flown in like a breeze and been triumphantly delivered by Guaido to the Miraflores presidential palace, which was stormed and occupied by a crowd of his supporters, the pseudo-humanitarian aid remained in Cucuta, blocked at the border by the Venezuelan army, but also by the Chavista people, who valiantly resisted in what was dubbed "the Battle of the Bridges." Two years later (2021), a report by the USAID Inspector General revealed that of the 368 tons of aid announced with great fanfare, only 8 tons (2%) had been distributed in Venezuela. The rest, after being stored for a time in Colombia, was distributed there or sent to Somalia [42].

Announcements, meetings, and handshakes followed one another in front of the cameras. As early as 2019, USAID signed an agreement with Carlos Vecchio, Guaidó's "ambassador" in Washington, allowing it to manage the money that would be directed toward "humanitarian aid." Bingo! Independently of the $467 million (2017-2022) supposed to assist migrants stranded in seventeen countries in the region [43], there was roughly $189 million to be distributed within Venezuela. Along came Covid: not a single mask would be purchased or delivered. Not a single vaccine. No medical supplies. No food. Parading online with his OAS accomplice Luis Almagro, Guaidó promised $300 to every Venezuelan doctor and nurse to fight the pandemic. Five years later, they still haven't received anything.

On the other hand, USAID greenbacks flow into the coffers of the coalition of NGOs and other shadow organisations involved in the destabilisation of the country – Foro Civico, Ciudadania Activa, Espacio Público, Foro Penal (privileged source, as we have seen, of Amnesty International), Redes Ayudas, Súmate, Fundación Futuro Presente, Rescate Venezuela, Cedice-Atlas-Libertad, Un Mundo Sin Mordaza (UMSM), Coalición Ayuda y Libertad (created by Guaidó himself to raise funds for “humanitarian aid”), Movimiento Ciudadano Dale Letra, Acción Solidaria, Fetrasalud, Monitor Salud, Observatorio Electoral Venezolano, Academia Nacional de Medicina, Movimiento de Sindicatos de Base (Mosbase), Unión Vecinal, etc.

On September 15, 2022, before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, USAID Assistant Administrator for Latin America and the Caribbean, Marcela Escobari, reiterated the need to "increase pressure on Venezuela." The agency would, through the Wilson Center, become involved in financing the opposition primaries (which María Corina Machado won), an opportunity, according to Escobari, for the right to "rebuild its unity and regain its momentum." Without mincing words, she expressed her intention to fund media outlets and NGOs that wished to serve as platforms to give greater weight to the issues of the "migration crisis" and "human rights violations."

Rumours, rumours, rumours. Questions have long been raised about the use of the colossal sums made available to the Venezuelan opposition. For a long time now, the beginnings of a response have been made, and one would have to be blind, deaf, complicit, or a journalist not to notice.

It's not just crooks within USAID; some believe in their mission. Following the audit of the more than $507 million invested at that time by the United States government in Venezuela, a report from the Agency itself—"Improved processes and implementation requirements are needed to address challenges and fraud risks in USAID's response to Venezuela"—warned in April 2021 that approximately 2% of humanitarian aid reached those in need, while the remaining 98% was used for purposes other than those initially intended. The report accuses the interim government of Juan Guaidó of "influencing decisions regarding resource allocation." Among the irregularities is the fact that "orders issued by the USAID Administrator's office were given verbally and without justification [44]."

A causal relationship? On the "Venezuela" page of the USAID website, the Biden administration is eliminating the figures.

And here comes Trump again. He is "unpredictable," everyone will tell you. He is proving it beyond all belief. He is attacking USAID! According to him, many of the agency's projects could only have been funded if there was corruption. "No one could have approved this. They could only have approved it by taking bribes," he declares, ordering the agency's closure before it can definitively devour American taxpayers' money.

Tongues are loosening. Facts are surfacing. YouTube footage of large checks being handed out with great fanfare resurfaces. Individuals disguised as respectable individuals are singled out. Juan Guaidó, Carlos Vecchio, David Smolanski, Julio Borges, Leopoldo López, Roberto Marrero, Yon Goicoechea, Miguel Pizarro, Freddy Guevara, Lester Toledo, Antonio Ledezma. The cream of radical anti-Chavismo, luxuriously exiled in Madrid or Miami. Not to mention Saint Maria Corina Machado. Venezuelan opposition leader Anthony Daquin, a political analyst and security expert living in the United States, publicly accuses the leaders of the "interim government" and dozens of NGOs of embezzling $856 million—including $150 million for Guaidó's "government" alone.

Jordan Goudreau, the head of SilverCorp and a mercenary who organised Operation Gideon from the United States and Colombia in May 2020, aimed at overthrowing or eliminating Maduro, has resurfaced. The coup failed. Guaidó had signed a contract with Goudreau. Goudreau was never paid. Goudreau "snitches." Goudreau urges Elon Musk to investigate Guaidó and Leopoldo López in corruption cases involving USAID funds.

Panic is more than palpable! Will the counterrevolution devour its children? U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi announced on March 25 the creation of a special task force within the Department of Justice to investigate and prosecute all those involved in the fraud uncovered by Musk's DOGE team. “An interim task force is working with all relevant agencies,” she warned, “and if you have committed fraud, we will prosecute you.” Trump II holds in his hands the fate of the corrupt Venezuelans who deceived Trump I by gorging themselves on taxpayer money, money they blithely embezzled—while contributing to the ruin of their country.

Year after year, country after country, the story is always the same. On April 11, 2015, at the 7th Summit of the Americas in Panama, Argentine President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner criticised those NGOs that "always fight for freedom or for human rights or for all the praiseworthy things that we all share, NGOs whose funding is never known, who are always ready to make the most esoteric accusations, impossible to verify, but whose clear aim is to destabilise the governments of the region and, curiously, those governments that have done the most for equity, for education and for social inclusion. »

On several occasions in 2021, 2023, and 2024, Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) publicly complained to his counterpart Joe Biden about USAID's funding of "openly opposition" organizations. He cited the emblematic case of Mexicans Against Corruption and Impunity (MCCI). Established as a non-profit organisation in 2015, MCCI only began receiving USAID funding in 2018, coincidentally during the first year of AMLO's government. The organisation's president, González Guajardo, resigned in 2020 to focus on supporting Va por México, an opposition electoral alliance composed of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), the National Action Party (PAN), and the Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD). According to the Mexican head of state, the resources transferred to this association, which is highly hostile to the government, amounted to $5.92 million from 2018 to 2023.

Under these circumstances, it is not surprising that, in their plan to dismantle USAID, Trump and Musk have found a seemingly unexpected supporter: Claudia Sheinbaum. "The agency is involved in so many things that, honestly, it would be better if it were simply shut down," the current Mexican president declared at a press conference on February 4. "If aid is to be provided, it should go through other transparent channels—that's the real problem."

At this point, there is no need to endlessly multiply examples. Those cited above do not, moreover, preclude the possibility that, in many circumstances, relations between USAID and a particular government are excellent. As long as he's right-wing, of course. Washington's unconditional support for Bogotá, particularly significant over the past forty-five years, has increased further since the Bill Clinton administration (1993-2001) and Plan Colombia [45], and then under the mandates of Álvaro Uribe, Juan Manuel Santos, and Iván Duque. Since 2016, USAID has been significantly involved in financing programs linked to the Peace Accords signed with the former FARC guerrillas—support for the Special Jurisdiction for Peace (JEP), rural reform, substitution of illicit crops, and development of strategic areas—a situation all the more paradoxical given that these accords were torpedoed and rendered completely inoperative by President Duque. This raises the question: what could a significant portion of this money have been used for? In 2023, under center-left President Gustavo Petro, with $389 million funding hundreds of programs, Colombia is the Latin American country that received the largest contribution from USAID—the second being Haiti ($316 million), followed by Venezuela. The freezing of the manna raises serious concerns: will it jeopardise the peace accords? Leader of the National Liberation Army (ELN), a historical guerrilla group still active, Antonio García recalls in this regard the terms of the Truth Commission report, which, among other responsibilities, points to that of Washington: “This leaves us with a question because the one [the United States] that has long been a driving force of war in Colombia is now acting, quite simply, as a ‘disinterested’ driving force of peace.”

All things being equal, but in the same vein, although far from Latin America, another case could be cited. In November 2024, USAID approved a $230 million fund to support "economic recovery and development programs" in the Palestinian territories. With these grants, the International Medical Corps (IMC) established two large field hospitals in Gaza, one in Deir Al Balah, in the centre, and the other in Al Zawaida, in the south. While the healthcare system within the territory is on the verge of collapse, these two facilities manage to treat more than 3,000 civilians per month [46]. For many observers, a cessation of USAID assistance is "unimaginable" under the current circumstances. What's even more unimaginable is that the bombs that torture Gazans and send them to hospitals funded by Washington's left arm are provided by... the right arm of the United States government.

Development aid has never been more essential. Nevertheless, there is no reason to rejoice or lament the dismantling of USAID. Too many poisonous plants hide beneath the green foliage of this inviting forest. Officially, 5,200 funding programs have been cut—83% of all programs. According to the State Department, only just over 500 have been confirmed. Among these, "vital" grants such as food assistance and treatments for AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria patients have been maintained, as well as programs for "sensitive" countries such as Lebanon, Haiti, and, of course, Venezuela and Cuba!

Caught in the maelstrom unleashed by Trump, Musk, and Rubio, hundreds of international organizations and NGOs received an email from the State Department. Among the 36 questions it contains is this one: "Can you confirm that your organisation does not work with entities associated with communism, socialism, totalitarianism, or any other entity that espouses anti-American beliefs?" It's also a good idea for recipients to confirm that their projects do not focus on "climate or environmental justice," knowing that it would be better for them not to have received "any funding from China, Russia, Cuba, or Iran."

Make no mistake. The current "cleansing" operation is primarily aimed at demonising the Democratic camp and "progressive" causes while slashing spending not directly related, in Trump's version, to the "core interests" of the United States. In one form or another, under the same name or a different acronym, the dark side of USAID will undoubtedly remain tomorrow the instrument of "hard power" that it has always been.

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