Talking Around the Illegality of Trump Dismantling USAID

Talking Around the Illegality

of Trump Dismantling USAID

Politico (2/14/25) would have better helped readers’

understanding if it hadn’t taken “Trump’s plans to

shrink the federal workforce” at face value. 

 

by Luca GoldMansour

 

A

re the corporate media outlets report



ing on Donald Trump and Elon Musk’s

authoritarian takeover smarter than a

fifth grader? Recent coverage of the presi

dent and his henchman’s blatantly unconsti

tutional dismembering of the US Agency for

International Development (USAID) would

suggest some are not.

Reports on the agency’s shuttering (NBC,

2/4/25; Politico, 2/14/25) often failed to suf

ficiently sound the alarm on how Trump’s

efforts are upending the most basic—and vi

tally important—federal checks and balanc

es one learns about in a Schoolhouse Rock

episode. Instead, these reports framed bed

rock constitutional principles as if they were

up for debate, and neglected to mention that

the Trump administration is purposefully

attempting to shirk executive restraints.

Meanwhile, much of corporate media’s

justified attention on the foreign aid agency’s

demise has wasted ink on a narrower, unjus

tifiable reason to draw objections: the loss of

the “soft power” USAID gives America in its

battle over global influence (CNN, 2/7/25;

New York Times, 2/11/25). This sets up the

precedent that Musk’s federal bludgeoning

should be assessed based on the value of his

target, rather than on the fact that he is sub

verting the Constitution. 

 

‘The least popular thing’ 

 

Longstanding judicial precedent holds that

only Congress has the ability to create and

dissolve federal agencies. Last year, the leg

islature prohibited even a reorganization of

USAID without its consultation in an appro

priations law. The Trump administration’s

actions—justified solely by an extreme in

terpretation of executive authority—violate

the Constitution’s separation of powers.

Trump and Musk share interest in recon

stituting US governance. The checks and

balances that help to constrain executive

power are also roadblocks to the billions

in federal contracts that have underwritten

Musk’s empire. They targeted USAID first

because its relative unpopularity among

voters means they might get away with re

writing the Constitution without too much

v>

public outrage. (Americans tend to vastly

overestimate how much the US spends on

foreign aid, and think it should be “reduced”

to a level that is actually far more than US

AID’s current budget—Program for Public

Consultation, 2/8/25.)  

Such a threat to democracy requires calling

it out for what it is. Simple but consequential

abdications of responsibility abound, though.

Politico (1/31/25) gave a stamp of ap

proval on Trump’s move to subsume USAID

into the State Department, pointing out

it was the fulfillment of long-held biparti

san aspirations—corporate media’s highest

praise—while ignoring the unconstitutional

means that brought it about. For years, the

article said, “both Democratic and Republi

can administrations have toyed with the idea

of making USAID a part of the State Depart

ment.” The article qualified that USAID “de

scribes itself ” as an independent agency, as if

this were up for dispute.

In a lengthy NBC report (2/4/25), the

question of constitutionality was suggested

only once (“whether it would take an act of

Congress to abolish USAID”), and the outlet

let Trump answer it unchallenged: “I don’t

know, I don’t think so…. We just want to do

the right thing.” 

 

‘Keep America safe’ 

 

USAID oversees billions in foreign aid that is

responsible for lifesaving food, medical care,

infrastructure and economic development.

The massive disruption in that aid is already

causing death, hunger, disease outbreak and

economic hardship. But a defense of that

lifesaving work, and the democratic norms

threatened by its unraveling, need not require

a rosy picture of its imperialist motivations.

The New York Times’ Daily podcast

(2/11/25) painted just such a picture in its ep

isode “The Demise of USAID and American

Soft Power.” Nowhere during its 35-minute

run time were the constitutional principles at

stake in USAID’s closure mentioned.

Instead, the podcast focused on what

podcast host Michael Barbaro described

as Trump’s overturning of a decades-long

bipartisan consensus about the best way to

“keep America safe.” That safety, Barbaro

learned by way of his guests’ contribution, is

a supposedly serendipitous return on invest

ment America receives through its strategic

generosity abroad.

The podcast completely left out USAID’s

modern role in conditioning aid to devel

oping countries on opening up their econ

omies to the International Monetary Fund

and multinational corporations, creating the

conditions for neo-colonial dispossession

and Western dependency.

Pointing out how Trump’s actions harm

people, including his own supporters, is

good journalism. But the loss of imperial

soft power is not an example of that. And

pointing out the actual harms without dis

cussing the autocratic way they were inflict

ed risks suggesting that unconstitutional ac

tions are acceptable as long as their results

are beneficial.

■

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