US secretary of state says America has suspended foreign aid to review priorities

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has stated that while America is not abandoning its commitment to foreign aid, the process and structure must be reorganised in alignment with national interests.

Source: Rubio during an interview on the Patriot podcast on SiriusXM, as reported by European Pravda

Details: Rubio emphasised that the United States is not abandoning foreign aid and insisted that America "will be involved".

"I believe that foreign aid done right is good for the country, but it has to be done right," he said.

In his opinion, the notion that the US must "spend between US$40 and US$60 billion on foreign aid, and all that money is well spent or on things that make sense, is absurd".

"There’s a lot of it that isn’t," Rubio stated.

He said all foreign aid needs to be reviewed. A significant portion is distributed through the US Agency for International Development (USAID), while some goes through the State Department.

"Identify the foreign aid that makes sense, the foreign aid that actually supports our country and that supports our national interests, and continue to do that; and then get rid of the ones that are a waste of money, or in some cases run counter to our national interest and to our interests around the world," Rubio asserted.

Currently, he said, the US has suspended all foreign aid in order to go through it project by project. Those that prove pointless will be terminated, while those that are beneficial will be retained and possibly built on.

Background: 

• In its first few days, US President Donald Trump’s administration halted international funding through USAID, an agency that Trump says he intends to dissolve.
• Following the shutdown of USAID operations, employees of the agency worldwide were placed on administrative leave.
• On 7 February, Trump stated that corruption within USAID was "at levels rarely seen", and therefore it must be closed down.
• That same day, a US judge temporarily allowed approximately 2,700 USAID employees who had been placed on leave by the Trump administration to return to work, suspending the implementation of some aspects of the plan to dissolve the agency.

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