President Trump shut down USAID because of waste and corruption, but also because taxpayer money was flowing directly and indirectly to groups promoting liberal agendas in opposition to U.S. policy.President Trump was criticized for cutting USAID funding shortly after taking office in his second term. He argued that USAID was plagued by waste, fraud, and corruption, with taxpayer money funding projects such as DEI workplace training in Serbia and transgender theater productions in Ireland.The White House released a documented list of expenditures that included hundreds of thousands of dollars to a nonprofit linked to designated terrorist organizations after an OIG investigation had been launched, millions to EcoHealth Alliance, which was involved in research related to the Wuhan lab, and funding that resulted in hundreds of thousands of meals being distributed to al Qaeda-affiliated fighters in Syria.Beyond waste and fraud, USAID funds also flowed to organizations that were at odds with U.S. interests, including groups that funded protests against U.S. policies within the United States and undermined US policy abroad.George Soros, one of the largest donors to the Democratic Party and left-wing causes in the United States, became a central figure in the USAID corruption debate. Open Society Foundations has stated that claims it receives USAID funds or directs USAID spending are “manifestly false.” However, the organization’s own records and federal grant data indicate a financial relationship with USAID.The Soros Foundations’ 2001 annual report listed USAID as a “donor partner,” while congressional testimony by Tyler O’Neil, citing USASpending.gov records, documented USAID grants to the Alliance for Open Society International, a legal arm of the Open Society Foundations. The grants were identified by federal grant numbers AID122A000200042, SLMAQM11GR635, and SLMAQM11GR0635. The arrangement creates a circular flow of taxpayer money, with federal funds flowing to Soros-linked organizations that then support left-wing activism, protests, and Democrat-aligned groups.In addition to funding Soros-linked organizations directly, USAID awarded more than $27 million to the Tides Center, an organization that has received tens of millions of dollars from Soros’s Open Society Foundations.The Tides Center functions as a donor-advised fund that masks the identity of original donors. Its grants do not disclose which donor directed the funds, and the IRS does not require donor disclosure. Tides founder Drummond Pike stated, “Anonymity is very important to most of the people we work with.” In 2023, the Tides network took in nearly $800 million, with major donors including Soros, the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, and the Ford Foundation.Politico reported in May 2024 that Tides was “seeded by Democratic megadonor George Soros.” A New York Post review of Open Society Foundation records found OSF provided $13.7 million to Tides during 2016–2022, and tax filings show OSF contributed $25.8 million between 2020 and 2021 alone, earmarking portions for pro-Palestinian causes. Beyond direct funding, Tides is a major funder of the Shadow Party, a Soros-conceived network of unions, nonprofit activist groups, and think tanks engaged in campaigning for Democrats.After September 11, 2001, Tides formed a “9/11 Fund,” later replaced by the “Democratic Justice Fund,” financed in large part by the Open Society Institute. The Tides Center also launched Palestine Legal, which provides legal representation to anti-Israel protesters.The USAID-Tides connection extended to domestic political activism. According to a review of USASpending.gov records, the People’s Forum, one of the organizations coordinating protests against Trump’s deportation orders, received $3.5 million from USAID indirectly through NGOs. Other organizations in the same network receiving USAID funds include Liberation in a Generation ($1 million), which seeks to abolish capitalism; Haymarket People’s Fund ($5 million), funding anti-racist grassroots organizations; and TRANSFORMING POWER ($3 million). USAID also awarded over $800,000 to New Venture Fund, another dark money pass-through nonprofit.Tides has funded Jewish Voice for Peace, the Council on American-Islamic Relations, IfNotNow, CodePink, and the Westchester County Peace Action Committee, which supports Students for Justice in Palestine and American Muslims for Palestine. In 2024, Tides funded Columbia University pro-Palestinian campus protests through its donations to Jewish Voice for Peace and IfNotNow.Tides granted $286,000 to the Alliance for Global Justice in 2023, which served as the fiscal sponsor of Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network, sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury Department in October 2024 as a “sham charity” providing material support to the PFLP, a terrorist organization that participated in the October 7 Hamas attack.The same funding pipeline extended into foreign politics. Between 2021 and 2024, USAID and the State Department awarded more than $50 million to Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors (RPA). During that period, RPA donated $557,000 to its affiliate, the Rockefeller Brothers Fund (RBF), which then provided approximately $4 million to groups funding anti-Israel protests in the United States and Israel, including $440,000 to Jewish Voice for Peace.RPA maintained that its federally funded projects had “no direct relation to Israel.” The committee’s counterargument was that federal grants covering one part of a nonprofit’s budget free up other funds for unrelated activities.The House Judiciary Committee’s July 2025 memo on Israel provides the most fully documented instance of the complete pipeline. The Biden-Harris administration provided $42,000 to the Movement for Quality Government to conduct Civic Activism Training in Israeli high schools.PEF Israel Endowment Funds provided over $884 million to groups involved in anti-democracy protests. The Jewish Communal Fund provided over $42.8 million to the anti-Netanyahu protest headquarters and its two main funders. Abraham Initiatives, a U.S. government grantee that received approximately $2 million in federal funds, led anti-government protests in Israel and, according to a 2023 audit, failed to comply with anti-terrorism procedures in a USAID-funded program.The committee concluded the Biden administration “provided grant funds to groups that contributed directly and indirectly to the judicial reform protests that sought to undermine the Israeli government.”The terrorism connections were not limited to pass-through funding. The Middle East Forum found evidence of $164 million in approved USAID grants, $122 million of which ended up supporting radical or terror-tied organizations. The Bayader Association for Environment and Development in Gaza received at least $900,000 in U.S. government funding despite openly collaborating with Hamas officials and holding joint events with Hamas leaders. USAID issued a grant to Bayader on October 1, 2023, one day before the Hamas attack on Israel.World Vision, a humanitarian NGO receiving USAID grants, sub-awarded funds to the Islamic Relief Agency, a group sanctioned for financing terrorism. A 2023 USAID Inspector General audit found two material instances of noncompliance with anti-terrorism reporting procedures in one USAID-funded program.At a House Oversight DOGE Subcommittee hearing in June 2025, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene described what she called the “Democrat Circle of Life”: a Democrat administration creates grant programs for NGOs and directs taxpayer resources to those organizations; former officials then leave government to work for the NGOs, collect taxpayer-funded salaries, and donate to Democrat campaigns. Greene stated, “Federal agencies fund the NGOs, and the NGOs shape the agencies’ behavior. It can be hard to tell where the government ends, and the NGO begins.”Federal Election Commission data show that 97% of USAID employees’ personal donations went to Democrats. Personnel records show former USAID officials moving into Democrat-aligned NGOs. USAspending.gov records show those NGOs receiving taxpayer grants, while FEC data show NGO leaders donating to Democrat campaigns.The central mechanism enabling this pipeline is fungibility. As Rep. Jim Jordan stated, “Money is fungible. It’s tough to track exactly, but it looks like some of this money was also then being run through one or two NGOs, winding up on college campuses.” When USAID funds one part of an NGO’s budget, the organization’s other funds are freed for protests and political activism without the grant explicitly authorizing those activities. The post USAID Liberal Corruption and Circular Funding: How Taxpayer Dollars Were Used Against U.S. Policies and Interests appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.