Hundreds of thousands have died from infectious diseases and malnutrition thanks to the Trump administration gutting USAID. Those funds would have gone toward fighting numerous preventable and treatable diseases abroad.
Instead, Reuters has found that the Trump administration doled out $15 million of those funds for the personal security detail of Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vought.
Trump picked Vought, a key architect of Project 2025, to head the powerful OMB after pretending to know nothing about the Project during the campaign. It just so happens that throttling USAID funding was part of Project 2025’s plan, too. Vought also became the acting director of USAID. Convenient!
The $15 million is to cover the costs for Vought’s protection by the U.S. Marshals Service until the end of 2026, according to documents reviewed by Reuters.
This is not the Marshals Service’s usual job. Reuters said it “typically protects federal courthouses, judges and court personnel.”
“Asked about Vought, the Marshals Service said it ‘could offer protection to members of the executive branch who face threats or at the direction of the Attorney General,’” Reuters reported.
Last month, a man was arrested and later charged with attempting to murder Vought after showing up at his home last year. But, as The New Republic noted, “the irony of the man who ripped disease-fighting funding away from some of the most at-risk people in the world only to use it to beef up his personal bodyguard staff is impossible to ignore.”
That’s not counting how willing the Trump administration is to have its ICE goons murder American citizens. Or have them die from lack of health insurance.
