Conservatives and libertarians are correct to draw attention to all sorts of reckless spending within the federal government. President Donald Trump has deputized Elon Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) to root out waste, fraud, and abuse. DOGE has recently fixated on the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), which spends billions of dollars on foreign aid to other countries. Foreign aid is an unpopular category of government spending—even though many Americans mistakenly believe that it constitutes a large proportion of overall spending—and it makes sense to closely scrutinize USAID's activities.
However, some critics of USAID have seized on a misleading claim: Namely, that the organization was funneling millions of dollars to Politico. In reality, it appears that government agents were paying for subscriptions to Politico's premium product. That may or may not be a worthwhile use of government funds (more on this in a moment), but at any rate, it does not represent some kind of direct subsidy to the news outlet.
Many conservative social media personalities seem to feel differently. On Wednesday, rightwing pundit Benny Johnson—among others—circulated the rumor on X that Politico had received $8 million from USAID. Johnson clearly thought this was a big story; he appended the caption "biggest scandal in news media history," with no further qualifications.
