How does China benefit from Donald Trump's shutdown of USAID?

[mahatmakanejeeves]

Hat tip, Mike Masnick

Mike Masnick
‪@mmasnick.bsky.social‬

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Put this one directly into the "who could have possibly foreseen this?" file...

‪Ethan Zuckerman‬ ‪@ethanz.bsky.social‬
·
38m
Guess who loves the USAID shutdown? Chinese nationalists, who are amplifying Trump/Musk conspiracy theories about the agency: globalvoices.org/2025/02/18/h...

How does China benefit from Donald Trump’s shutdown of USAID?
Individuals and organizations that were funded by USAID have become targets of a smear campaign attempting to discredit their work.
globalvoices.org

https://bsky.app/profile/mmasnick.bsky.social/post/3liparoz3gs2d

How does China benefit from Donald Trump’s shutdown of USAID?
Chinese online nationalists are echoing Elon Musk's false claims about USAID

Written by
Oiwan Lam
Read this post in українська
Posted 18 February 2025 1:00 GMT


Image from USAID's Flickr. CC: BY-SA 2.0.

United States President Donald Trump’s move to dismantle the US Agency for International Development (USAID) at the beginning of his second term in January 2025 has shaken the world as its humanitarian and development programs covered more than 100 countries at the time of its shutdown.

Soon after freezing the agency’s operation, the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), led by Trump’s top adviser and controversial billionaire Elon Musk, moved in to investigate the alleged “corruption” and “mismanagement” of the governmental agency.

In 2023, USAID handled about USD 43.4 billion in funds around the world, and its biggest projects were humanitarian relief in Ukraine and other war zones, AIDS relief and health crisis response in African countries, and refugee support in South Asian and Latin American countries. In addition, it also funded civic groups and independent media outlets in many undemocratic countries to extend the US’s soft power.

Although, for years, the agency has been criticized for its inefficiency and waste, American political sociologist Larry Diamond warned that the shutdown decision, along with Trump’s isolationist diplomacy, would undermine the US’s geopolitical leadership:

LarryDiamond
@LarryDiamond
Imagine how gleeful Communist China, Communist Cuba, Putin, Kim Jong Un, Iran's ayatollahs, & other tyrants are at Trump's moves to shut down USAID, kill NED, trash the UN system, and withdraw from the world. A giant gift to our adversaries and a massive blow to global freedom.

Link to tweet

{snip}

[CrispyQ]

1. Programs like USAID are called soft power, a concept Trump doesn't get & never will.

Just like most repubs, if you can't put the benefits of something on a spreadsheet, it has no value.

[Irish_Dem]

2. Sounds like some people are finally able to add 2 plus 2 and get four.

Slow learners.