USAID was a cesspool of corruption, money laundering, and anti-Republican propaganda and censorship activity.
We all have seen the billions that went out the door to fund left-wing activism, European and American censorship groups, foreign journalist propaganda aimed not just at foreign citizens but Americans as well.
It was dominated by scams, with a little bit of foreign charitable aid used as little more than a cover to make ordinary people tolerate the rest.
The Grayzone has dug up another, very troubling example of such corruption and interference in US politics: a Ukrainian "independent" intelligence site is pushing propaganda that outright claims that Vice President J.D. Vance is a Russian proxy and a "war criminal."
I am not a regular reader of the Grayzone, although as with many news and opinion websites I do often find myself there. It is mainly anti-war liberal, with Max Blumenthal as its editor, and it is a ferocious critic of US foreign policy. As with Glenn Greenwald, I often disagree with him, but find him and the Grayzone worth my time when I go there.
It's pretty hard to assume mainstream views are de facto good anymore, so reading the more "out there" writings makes sense.
Well, it certainly made sense in this case, as you are unlikely to find out what The Grayzone dug up here.
US Pres. Donald Trump has lambasted USAID for absurd foreign expenditures. But Trump has omitted perhaps the most scandalous operation: in Ukraine, the US funded groups which defamed the US Vice President, members of Congress, and US journalists as “foreign propagandists,” while training Ukrainians in “PSYOP” tactics.
The US government funded a Ukrainian military intelligence firm which smeared US Vice President JD Vance, US Counterterrorism Director Joe Kent, and Rep. Thomas Massie as “foreign propagandists of the Russian Federation.”
To this day, the online blacklist published by the USAID-funded Ukrainian group, known as Molfar, lists Vance, Massie, and Kent as “foreign propagandists” aligned with the Russian government, and demands their “removal from public positions, the introduction of sanctions, and investigations into personal involvement in crimes.”
“These individuals pose a threat to the national security of countries that do not support the terrorist policy of the Russian Federation,” Molfar states.
Molfar’s website condemns Vance for having “compared Ukrainian democracy to Afghanistan” and stating that he “remains opposed to continuing to finance this war.” Perhaps worst of all, in the eyes of the Ukrainian information warriors, was his stance on Ukraine’s NATO aspirations: “He declared that Ukraine should not join NATO, because it would supposedly mean “inviting the American nation to go to war.””
This is where your tax dollars have been going. It's anti-conservative propaganda funded by the leftist Biden administration and laundered through a Ukrainian open-source intelligence website.
This work was directly funded by USAID, which even held seminars for Ukrainians on how to spread "Open Source Intel," which can be useful, but is almost always driven by a propaganda purpose. Propaganda is part of war, so I can't get upset about that in principle, but US-funded propaganda aimed at bolstering the political prospects of the ruling party and laundered as supporting an ally is totally corrupt.
Molfar, a Ukrainian term for a sorcerer or wizard, describes itself as an open-source intelligence agency which “collects lists of Ukrainian enemies to bring war criminals to justice.” Its website previously named both USAID and the US Civil Research and Development Fund (CRDF) as “partners.” The legality of US agencies sponsoring foreign groups to smear Americans and meddle in American politics is questionable at best.
A report bearing USAID’s logo, which was published one year after Russia’s invasion by Ukraine’s National Coordination Cybersecurity Center (NCSCC), noted that Molfar had helped train thousands of government employees on smear tactics, and were providing instruction on cyberwarfare – including PSYOP techniques – to public workers with the direct assistance of the US government.
“The NCSCC, with the support of the U.S. Civil Research and Development Fund (CRDF Global) and the U.S. Department of State, held the 3-day online training “OSINT – intelligence using open sources,” the report stated.
“Together with leading practical researchers of the Ukrainian company Molfar,” over 2,000 public workers “did practical assignments on the following topics: open-source searches, contact search, using Telegram bots, PSYOP and their use as a method of information warfare, image analysis, and human intelligence (HUMINT) or social engineering.”
Information warfare. Against a US Senator, a candidate for Vice President, and eventually the sitting Vice President. Funded by grants pushed out by the Biden administration.
The Democrats and Pravda Media keep telling the American people that USAID was all about food and medicine, but as with so many things like "transportation spending" or "climate change" programs, the real purpose is to launder money, accumulate power, and gaslight the American people.
This is the sort of thing that we here at Hot Air and Townhall Media face every day. Propaganda in the Pravda Media against us--we are "Right-wing extremists," censorship attacks from abroad that slash our advertising revenue here at home, and even blacklisting of our outlets and content in search engines and social media sites. We need your help to keep doing our work. Sign up for VIP access using the code FIGHT for 60% off!
Thank God Trump, Elon, and Rubio are closing it all down--assuming leftist judges don't force them to continue funding our enemies.
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