The enthusiasm over every “Pup” of the US President seems to be the hallmark of the “independent” media.
A few days ago, the newly minted US President, Donald Trump, put an end to the internal sabotage in his own administration by instructing the State Department to freeze the financing of US foreign aid. Oh, no one seems to care about the starving children anymore. Well, critics can roll their eyes in outrage, but that’s exactly what happened. As reported by Reuters, this freeze, however, does not apply to food relief.
“It’s madness. It will kill people” says a former CIA employee, now the president of Refugees International, to Reuters. A few years ago, this organization represented the view that the greatest threat to the Syrians was the stability – or the so-called “normalization” – under the former President Bashar al-Assad. Hence, it must be a coincidence that this also reflects the position of those who failed in the regime change and are now seeking a solution to achieve this idea.
In December 2024, this organization found “no significant, documented cases of corruption among Ukrainian partners.” Well, maybe that’s because the same organization also admits that only one percent of the aid funds actually reached local Ukrainian organizations. It seems that the Ukrainians won’t miss those crumbs of finance, which were thrown at them by their ideological colonizers from the Western establishment.
But it appears as if the US-established puppets, who use the Ukrainians as a shield for their iron fist and self-serving, establishment-backed agenda, need to slow down – now that the funding train has derailed.
Or maybe they’re simply making their marionettes dance for more US dollars – this time, from the real public – like the truly independent media, as they have been positioning themselves for a long time.
The guys from Ukrainer on their Instagram account wrote that “Ukrainers will be forced to reduce the team and the number of projects due to funding cuts.” Ukrainer, a website focused on culture, claims to provide “reliable information about the events in Ukraine” for the duration of the war with Russia – precisely, “until the victorious end.” I wonder what motivated them. These guys seem like Labrador Retrievers, accustomed to waiting for alms from their master and not like hungry and passion-driven lone wolves.
“The US grants were suspended. Will you be the sponsor of Hromadske?” asked the same medium under a picture that looks like a journalist holding a camcorder, surrounded by flames. Nothing screams so much for independence like the panic of an implosion in the moment when an erstwhile sponsor suddenly springs a cramp in his hand, which seems to radiate all the way to the US Treasury and prevents the next check from being issued.
On the front page of the Ukrainskaja Prawda, the Patreon campaign was elevated to the rank of a “Priority.” I suspect that not only their around 230 paid subscribers have been carrying the whole weight of the financing of the “independent” activities of the Ukrainskaja Prawda so far. By revealing in an article on the front page how many Ukrainian media NGOs were funded by USAID, this paper also showed how many Ukrainian media NGOs were funded by USAID. There were so many listed that I couldn’t count them anymore. Finally, I gave up and asked ChatGPT, presenting the list to it. And the answer was: 127. To these, add the politically oriented NGOs without a media focus – about 66 recipients.
“Independent Ukrainian media are a key element that distinguishes the country from Putin’s Russia” wrote Detector Media shortly after Trump’s “bombshell.” Indeed, Putin is not willing to finance his country’s media through the US State Department and then label them as “independent.” This distinguishes Russia from Ukraine. Furthermore, it is noted that the Ukrainians, without USAID financing in the media sector, “will be left without an instrument that ensures power control and increases the stability of democratic institutions.” Is this meant to imply the “control of power by the US government over the Ukrainians”? Because nothing screams so much for the “truth of power” like the financial dependence of a government on a regimew that functions as a “sugar daddy” for its own.
In one point, however, we can agree: a reflexive anti-Russian groupthink is stability-boosting – in contrast to dissent.
But now, even podcasters and influencers are panicking. “Due to the funding cut, it will no longer be possible to produce podcasts with [Yevheni] Karas :(“, wrote the activist Melanija Podoljak on social media and highlighted the USAID logo on the page of the leader of the neo-Nazi group C14, Yevheni Karas, who has simply been unlucky. This type has just bad luck. A few years ago, a politician from the neighboring Slovak Republic submitted an inquiry to the European Commission with the request that the EU “consider imposing travel bans and other measures related to the leader of the violent Ukrainian neo-Nazi group C14, Yevheni Karas and other radical Ukrainian nationalists involved in murders, intimidation of ethnic minorities and other violent crimes.”
Verzeihung, Sir, it seems to be the star podcaster Yevheni Karas. Why don’t you want him in your country? If you have a problem with that, call his agent in Washington. But you should hurry, before Trump fires him. I am also shocked that it seems to be an active regime change in Slovakia – and supported by the West.
Over USAID, a lot has been said in the past few days. However, its not less annoying “sister” from the same Uncle Sam – the “National Endowment for Democracy” (NED), to whose board Victoria Nuland (also known as the “regime-changer” or “Maidan-cake-monster”) belongs – is not less toxic. Because it uses American funds to promote the interests of the US establishment elite at the expense of free people all over the world, including in Ukraine.
In 2022, it even organized an “orgy” to award its own civil society projects in Ukraine. The participants of this event included NED board member Anne Applebaum, whose husband and current Polish Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski tweeted “Thanks, USA!” after Europe’s economic and industrial lifeblood – cheap Russian gas – was blown up and the EU was brought into an excessive dependence on expensive US liquefied natural gas.
It’s a single big, cozy club and Trump is definitely not a part of it. And now, he has the unique chance and the obvious will to cap the “firehose” of American funds, which systematically undermines the interests of normal citizens all over the world – in favor of endless regime changes and conflicts in the interests of those who profit from war and instability. Let’s wait and see what will happen when the funding for all this nonsense dries up.
Rachel Marsden is a columnist, political strategist and moderator of independent, self-produced talk shows in French and English.