President Trump has made huge strides in restoring trust in America’s generous foreign aid system by dismantling USAID, defunding woke United Nations agencies, global NGOs, and for-profit contractors. Congress must ensure that the National Security, Department of State, and Related Programs Appropriations Act, 2026 builds on this work and continues put Americans' interests first.
Exposing the Foreign Aid Bureaucracy
On day one in office, President Donald Trump issued an executive order freezing all U.S. foreign aid, blasting the sector as “run by radicals.” While the DC establishment and mainstream media outlets decried President Trump’s actions and claimed he was undermining US diplomacy, a cursory glance at the list of projects funded by U.S. foreign aid vindicated his suspicion.
At the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) alone, taxpayer dollars were funding a transgender opera in Colombia, sex changes and LGBT activism in Guatemala, and DEI programs in Serbian workplaces, along with millions of dollars flowing to non-profits linked to terrorist groups in the Middle East. Though President Trump closed USAID, the past year has shown that in the many foreign aid programs that remain, waste and fraud are the rule rather than the exception. Last September, the State Department released its America First Global Health Strategy, exposing “alarming inefficiencies and waste” that saw over 50% of foreign global health funding being spent on overhead rather than health services. Last month, aid to Yemen and Afghanistan was cut due to taxpayer-funded aid diversion to terrorists.
2026 Foreign Aid Bill
Earlier this week, Congress released its National Security, Department of State, and Related Programs Appropriations Act, 2026. This bill includes some key provisions backed by conservatives but falls short of adequately responding to American outrage over the systemic waste, fraud, and abuse built into the U.S. foreign aid bureaucracy. The bill makes inadequate cuts to foreign aid spending, fails to sunset never-ending aid programs, and continues funding entities that violated the public trust.
Positive Elements in the Bill
- Blocks progressive efforts to restore the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID).
- Codifies last year’s White House recissions of over $8 billion from accounts funding the U.N. and democracy promotion.
- Backs U.S. allies across the globe - especially in the Indo-Pacific - counters China’s imperial global designs, and confronts Iran, Cuba, and the drug cartels.
- Eliminates the woke agenda, including DEI, climate alarmism, and gender mandates that harm American interests and violate our values, while prohibiting funding for abortion.
- Makes deep cuts to globalist organizations, such as the U.N. Relief and Works Agency, U.N. Human Rights Council, and U.N. Population Fund.
- Ties aid to recipient country foreign policy choices while upholding international religious freedom.
Improvements Needed
With a reform-minded White House, Congress has a historic opportunity to make deeper and more lasting reforms. Unfortunately, this bill continues to finance the left-wing foreign aid establishment, handcuffing White House reform efforts and allowing its worst excesses to be quickly revived in a post-Trump White House. Heritage Action calls on Congress to better align the 2026 foreign aid bill and future efforts with Trump administration reforms:
1. Deeper cuts to Global Health
The bill offers a modest five percent cut to a corrupt, inefficient, and radicalized global health industry. The State Department’s Global Health Security Strategy exposed how taxpayers continue to fund inefficient programs that were plagued by high overhead costs, often exceeding 50 percent. The strategy recommends bypassing expensive international organizations and requires co-financing by recipient countries, resulting in large-scale savings. Congress should cut the global health budget to incentivize recipient countries to assume financial ownership of these programs and put an end to a corrupt and multi-billion-dollar aid industry.
2. Reform the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria
This multi-billion-dollar entity based in Geneva, Switzerland, should be audited in order to institute major governance reforms to eliminate waste, deradicalize its international staff, impose line-item transparency of where funds are spent, and end procurement from Communist China and other American adversaries.
3. Defund the National Endowment for Democracy (NED)
NED is a 501(c)(3) organization that has repeatedly violated its legal requirement to be bipartisan. NED is the global tip of the spear of disinformation and global censorship campaigns against conservatives, and interfered in our presidential elections by smearing then-candidate Trump as a potential fascist dictator. Congress should cut the $315 million in funding for NED and refuse to reward this unacceptable behavior.
4. Cut funding for the U.S. Institute for Peace
This government-funded public institution is captured by the left. The bill provides $20 million that enables USIP to offer globalists a Washington, D.C. platform to mislead Congress, the media, and foreign governments through its publications and global grants program. Congress should end funding for USIP.
5. Eliminate $410.5 million in funding for the Peace Corps
Founded over 60 years ago, the Peace Corps was intended to send college‑age American students to poor countries. It has never effectively promoted peace and now primarily serves as a talent pipeline for future left‑wing globalists. Modern communications technology has rendered the Peace Corps largely obsolete. Congress should eliminate funding for the program.
Conclusion
The Trump administration has radically transformed U.S. foreign aid from an international welfare program for the global left into an instrument to advance America’s global interests. Congress should not throw a lifeline to a corrupt left-wing foreign aid establishment. While this bill contains many key reforms, its spending levels remain too high, its reforms too weak, and it keeps open the door for the return of the progressive multi-billion-dollar aid industry. To put America first, Congress ought to pass a foreign aid bill that ends the left-wing foreign aid bureaucracy once and for all.