Chaos continues with Trump-Musk cuts to USAID

Summary

Summary of "Chaos Continues with Trump-Musk Cuts to USAID" – The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell

Release Date: February 13, 2025

In this episode of The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell, host Lawrence O'Donnell delves deep into the tumultuous political landscape shaped by the joint actions of former President Donald Trump and billionaire Elon Musk in their unprecedented cuts to the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). The discussion highlights the ramifications of these cuts on both domestic politics and international humanitarian efforts.

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1. Democratic Strategies Amid Minority Status

Rachel Maddow opens the conversation by addressing the Democrats' challenges operating in the minority within both the House and Senate. Drawing from her personal experience as a former Senate minority member, Maddow emphasizes the inherent "powerlessness" that comes with being in the minority. However, she underscores the Democrats' proactive measures to counteract this limitation.

"They are going to be, I think, as important, if not more important, than the official hearings that committees are having, because what the Democrats did in that unofficial hearing today... is more important than anything we heard in the official Republican controlled hearings."
[00:03] – Rachel Maddow

Maddow highlights the Democrats' innovative approach of conducting "informal hearings" or roundtables to compensate for their inability to hold official hearings. These sessions aim to spotlight Republican-led actions and bring expert testimonies to the forefront, thereby amplifying Democratic voices despite their minority status.

2. Impact of Trump-Musk Actions on USAID

Lawrence O'Donnell and Rachel Maddow transition to the crux of the episode: the significant cuts to USAID orchestrated by Elon Musk under the influence of Donald Trump. This move has led to the suspension of $40 billion in humanitarian aid, severely affecting millions globally.

"Donald Trump and the Republicans want to increase the national debt by $4 trillion while complaining about $57,000 at USAID."
[17:00] – Rachel Maddow

The discussion underscores the irony and potential backlash of advocating for substantial budget cuts to aid while simultaneously proposing a $4 trillion increase in the national debt. The $57,000 expenditure in Sri Lanka, deemed wasteful by Musk, serves as the pretext for these drastic cuts, leading to catastrophic consequences for vulnerable populations worldwide.

3. Congressional Response and Political Repercussions

Democratic representatives, including Melanie Stansberry and Sheldon Whitehouse, express outrage over the unilateral decision to dismantle USAID without substantial evidence of widespread financial mismanagement. They call for accountability from Elon Musk and demand his testimony before Congressional committees.

"We want him to come in front of the committee answering to the American people because millions of Americans are asking for him to be accountable for what he's doing."
[23:38] – Melanie Stansberry

The Republicans' refusal to subpoena Musk or allow him to testify exacerbates tensions, with Democrats accusing them of shielding corporate interests and undermining transparency. The establishment of new subcommittees and budget markups further fuels the partisan divide, as Democrats strive to expose what they perceive as fiscal irresponsibility and political payback against Trump-backed billionaires.

4. Humanitarian Crisis and Global Implications

The cuts to USAID have precipitated a humanitarian crisis in multiple regions, including Sudan, Kenya, Burkina Faso, and Ethiopia. Declan Walsh, Chief Africa Correspondent for The New York Times, provides harrowing accounts of the immediate effects on healthcare workers, refugee camps, and critical aid programs like PEPFAR.

"In Sudan, where civil war rages, communal kitchens serving 800 people in Khartoum have ceased, while 1.6 million people in Darfur are cut off from water and sanitation."
[34:47] – Declan Walsh

These disruptions not only endanger lives but also destabilize regions, undermining American security interests abroad. The withdrawal of aid hampers efforts to combat malnutrition, disease, and conflict, highlighting the profound interconnectedness of domestic policy decisions with global humanitarian outcomes.

5. Economic Policies and National Debt Concerns

Simultaneously, the Republicans' push to increase defense spending from $800 billion to $950 billion juxtaposes the critique of USAID's expenditures. This move raises questions about fiscal priorities and the long-term sustainability of the national debt.

"Republicans want to increase defense spending by more than triple the entire USAID budget."
[17:54] – Rachel Maddow

The proposed budget resolution, which includes a $4 trillion increase in the debt ceiling, is criticized as a catalyst for exacerbating economic instability. Democrats argue that the Republicans' focus on expanding the national debt while marginalizing critical humanitarian aid reflects misplaced priorities and neglect of sustainable economic stewardship.

6. Calls for Accountability and Transparency

Throughout the episode, the call for transparency and accountability remains a central theme. Democrats urge Elon Musk to testify before Congress to explain his drastic measures against USAID and to shed light on his broader influence on federal policies.

"If you have serious desire to engage in democracy and transparency, we welcome you to the Oversight Committee."
[23:38] – Melanie Stansberry

This demand underscores the growing concern over the influence of private billionaires on public policy and the potential erosion of governmental oversight and accountability.

7. Concluding Perspectives

The episode concludes with a somber reflection on the dire consequences of the Trump-Musk alliance's actions. The dismantling of USAID not only cripples vital humanitarian efforts but also signals a troubling shift in U.S. foreign aid policy, driven by partisan agendas rather than evidence-based decision-making.

Lawrence O'Donnell emphasizes the unpredictability of the Democrats' strategies in this "strange condition" of minority governance, suggesting that innovative approaches may yield unforeseen impacts on both domestic and international stages.

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Key Takeaways:

• Democratic Resilience: Despite minority status, Democrats are actively seeking alternative avenues to influence policy and expose Republican-led financial mismanagement.

• Humanitarian Crisis: Elon Musk's cuts to USAID, influenced by Donald Trump, have triggered widespread suffering in vulnerable regions, highlighting the global repercussions of domestic political decisions.

• Fiscal Controversies: The juxtaposition of advocating for aid cuts while proposing significant increases in the national debt raises critical questions about fiscal responsibility and economic priorities.

• Accountability Demands: There is a pressing need for transparency regarding the actions of private billionaires like Elon Musk in shaping federal policies and their broader implications on society.

This episode of The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell provides a comprehensive examination of the interplay between political power dynamics, fiscal policies, and their profound impact on global humanitarian efforts.

Transcript

[Lawrence O'Donnell]

Now it's time for the Last word with Lawrence O'Donnell. Good evening, Lawrence.

[Rachel Maddow]

Good evening, Rachel. So the Democrats are doing everything they can. You know, I haven't been one of those people complaining about why aren't they doing more. And it may be because I've internalized just how much powerlessness there is in a congressional minority when you're in the minority in the House, minority in the Senate. And when I worked in the Senate, I served in the minority for six months and I could not take a seventh month of it. And that's what I left. But I wanted to know what it was like in the minority and it's utter powerlessness. But you have these kinds of moments of basically seizing the Senate floor on a nomination like this and making your point and driving home your point. They also today did something else that I've been waiting for. I've been expecting. They're not allowed to hold hearings. Technically, hearings can only be convened by the chairman of the majority party. But the Democrats on the Foreign Relations Committee held what looks like a hearing, not a hearing. It's actually not in the hearing room, but it really looks like one. And all the Democrats showed up, no Republicans showed up to hear real experts who formerly worked at USAID explain to them what is really happening, what Elon Musk is really doing. And I think we're going to see more of those kind of informal hearings that Democrats in the House and the Senate will be having. They are going to be, I think, as important, if not more important, than the official hearings that committees are having, because what the Democrats did in that unofficial hearing today, which we're going to be showing a lot of later in this hour, is more important than anything we heard in the official Republican controlled hearings. And so they're doing everything they can do in this very strange condition of being in the minority in the Senate and the House.

[Lawrence O'Donnell]

I mean, I feel like, you know what, they all still have constituents. They all represent hundreds of thousands, if not millions of people. And the one thing for sure that doesn't work is doing nothing. And if it's really important that something get done, no, you can't guarantee that everything you're going to do is going to have X outcome, but do everything you can. You never know exactly what impact you're going to have. Try everything and try everything fast. In the case of somebody who's trying an authoritarian lightning takeover of the largest government economy in the world, I just think that Democrats know that they are speaking for half the country. And to the extent that they are going to pull out of the stops and get creative and try everything they can. I think that we ought to be sort of open minded about what kind of impact it might have. I think it may be, I mean, 20,000 people turning out on a teletown hall in Alabama last night, a state that Trump won by 30 points. I mean, there's something going on in the American public right now that I think Democrats are channeling and there's no telling where that goes.

[Rachel Maddow]

Yeah. And if people have been wanting Democrats to do something, they can help. They can actually get bits of video, for example, from those Democrats in the Foreign Relations Committee today and those witnesses, put them out on social media, help, actually show, actually show what the Democrats are doing instead of complaining that they're doing nothing. I mean, go ahead, keep complaining. But you can't say they did nothing today. They did, they tried.

[Lawrence O'Donnell]

They did. And I mean, honestly, if you want to complain, go to the congressional or Senate office of your Democratic member and tell them, I want you to do more. Like that's actually doing something rather than being a hypocrite and saying they're not doing anything while you're not doing anything. If you want more to be done. Physician, heal thyself.

[Rachel Maddow]

Yeah. And encourage them to do it. Help them do it. Get it out there.

[Lawrence O'Donnell]

Exactly.

[Rachel Maddow]

Thanks, Rachel. Thank you. Well, if you disapprove of the job Donald Trump is doing as president, you are not alone. 52% disapprove of the job Donald Trump is doing as president in a new Marquette University poll released today. And that is 2% more than the total number of people who voted against Donald Trump in the presidential election. Which means that some of those Trump voters, voters now disapprove of Donald Trump, maybe a couple of percent of them. And they have a right to disapprove of Donald Trump's job as president. If they believed Donald Trump in the presidential campaign when he said this, When I win, I will immediately bring prices down starting on day one. Well, we're past day one. And today the business news media was buzzing, not in a good way, about a surge in inflation reported today. Inflation shot up during the month of January and that may have tipped some Trump voters into disapproval of the job Donald Trump is doing because of that day one promise that prices would come down by sunset on inauguration Day. Now, I for one do not blame Donald Trump for the increase in inflation in the month of January. But then I didn't blame Joe Biden for the increases in inflation during the Biden presidency. And I didn't blame any previous president for increases in inflation during their presidency because presidential action usually has very little to no impact on inflation. Usually no impact. So my news coverage rule is that I don't blame the president, whoever the president is, for increases in prices unless the president takes flagrantly inflationary action, as Donald Trump has proposed doing with wildly inflationary tariffs that he has not yet imposed because someone must have told him just how inflationary his tariff ideas are. Jim Farley, the CEO of the Ford Motor Company, is living in fear of the Trump threatened tariffs, but not so much fear that he is afraid to speak out against them. Like most business executives, the CEO of Ford said a 25% tariff across the Mexico and Canadian border will blow a hole in the US Industry, the auto industry that we've never seen today. The guy who said he would stop inflation on day one of his presidency wrote Biden inflation up, exclamation point. Now, anyone who has the slightest literacy in economics knew that Donald Trump was lying about cutting inflation on day one during the campaign. But the Marquette poll indicates that some Trump voters are not in a forgiving mood about that. You are not alone if you oppose Donald Trump's January 6th pardons, including pardons of people who tried to kill police officers and wanted to kill Mike Pence. 65% oppose the January 6th pardons. And you are not alone if you oppose Donald Trump's renaming of the Gulf of Mexico. 71% oppose renaming the Gulf of Mexico. Wait until Donald Trump finds out the name of the state between Arizona and Texas. What name will he come up with for New Mexico? Whatever it is, the Marquette poll tells us that an overwhelming majority of Americans will oppose it. Today, a few members of the White House press corps were allowed to ask questions in the White House press briefing room with the White House press secretary at the podium, something that doesn't happen every day in the Trump White House, but did happen every day in the Biden White House. They asked questions about Elon Musk's possible conflict of interest, but no one in the White House press corps asked a question about Elon Musk literally snatching food away from starving babies. There has not been one question asked in the White House by anyone in the White House press corps to the White House press secretary or to Donald Trump about Elon Musk's decision, supported by Donald Trump, to take food away from starving babies, from starving mothers, from starving grandparents in Sudan, where the United States Agency for International Development was saving lives every day by getting food to people in the middle of a famine. Elon Musk's conflicts of interest, though, of course, are not as important as the people that he is actually killing in Africa this week. And that is what he's doing. That is what's happening. You heard Dr. Atul Gawande, former USAID official on this program Monday night, saying lives have already been lost, people have already died because of what Elon Musk decided to do to them. Elon Musk is African. He is from the continent that has suffered more starvation during his lifetime than anywhere else in the world. But when the White House press corps got their chance to ask him questions yesterday, not one of them asked how it feels to be holding his child in the Oval Office while he is starving children in Africa while children and their parents and their grandparents are dying because of his decision. The White House press secretary pretended that she was presenting proof of what she called fraudulent expenditures by the United States Agency for International Development today. She waved around a piece of paper and claiming that it showed $57,000 in an expenditure in Sri Lanka for we're not sure what that she didn't like, but she's sure it's fraudulent. Now, $57,000 is a lot of money, but it's not a lot of money in the budget of the United States of America and it's not a lot of money in the budget of USAID. Elon Musk stopped $40 billion of aid spending, humanitarian aid spending around the world by USAID, because he found, he says, a $57,000 item that he doesn't like and that was it. 57,000 was the total amount of complaint of abuse of spending that the White House came up with today as the reason to stop $40 billion in aid, as the reason to starve children, as the reason to deny medical care to a 71 year old woman who was turned away from a hospital after USAID was shut down, thereby killing her. That's what happened. That's what we did. Killing her in Miranmar. These stories are happening all over the world now. Declan Walsh, the New York Times Africa bureau chief, will join us later in this hour with his firsthand reporting of the suffering he has seen at the hands of the richest person in the world who has decided to inflict as much pain and death as he possibly can on the poorest people in the world, the poorest children in the world, the poorest starving infant babies in the world. Let's just assume for a moment that the $57,000 that USAID spent in Sri Lanka was a complete waste of money. Do you shut down an entire operation, a $40 billion operation, an entire government agency, over a disputed $57,000? The first claim by Elon Musk about shutting down USAID was that it had to be shut down temporarily so that they could properly evaluate all of its spending to make careful decisions about what should be cut. And a day later, Elon Musk was saying that USAID must be thrown in the wood chipper. That was his term, the wood chipper. It must be completely destroyed. And so the only reason we know it should be destroyed is because of $57,000 spent in Sri Lanka. And we're not sure what that was about. Every department of the government has regular audits, and no department of the government is shut down while those audits are happening. Every major corporation in America and small corporations in America and small businesses in America have audits, and they never shut down their business in order to have an audit. Ford CEO Jim Farley does not stop manufacturing cars and pickup trucks in order to run an audit of Ford. And every time they run an audit of Ford or any other company, they find $57,000 here or there that they decide not to spend any more because they think it isn't worth it. And I'm sure we can find $57,000 somewhere in the budget of USAID and in every budget in the federal government that we can decide to stop spending. But what manner of man would decide that? The thing that has to be stopped immediately is the delivery of food to starving children.

[Declan Walsh]

Globally. Food aid meant for 31 million people sit stranded in ports from Houston to Nairobi. Despite. Despite Friday's waiver to move supplies, a waiver waiver, largely granted because of congressional outreach, funds for distribution remain frozen. In fact, as of yesterday, humanitarian partners have received no payment for completed work predating the Stop Work order, nor for activities meant to be continued under the humanitarian waiver.

[Rachel Maddow]

Now, that looked like a hearing, as I was telling Rachel, but it wasn't an official hearing. The Democrats are in the minority in the House and the Senate, and so they're not allowed to conduct hearings. But Senate Democrats are now fighting against that restriction by conducting what they're calling roundtables in other rooms in the Senate buildings because they're not allowed to use the official hearing rooms. And that session was organized by the Democrats on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee today because they wanted to hear what Republican senators are afraid of hearing. Because every Republican senator, with the possible exception now of Mitch McConnell, is living in even more fear of Elon Musk than they are of Donald Trump. Elon Musk has threatened to pour his money into Republican primaries against any Republican senator who dares to vote against anything Donald Trump wants, including the most unqualified Cabinet members in history. We'll show you more of that unofficial hearing by the Democrats on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee later in this hour. Those kinds of hearings run by Democrats will only become increasingly more important for all of us to cover, because the claim made by some that the Democrats are not doing everything they can do in this situation isn't true. If you've ever worked in the House or Senate on the minority side, then you know exactly what powers the minority does not have, including the simple power to conduct an official hearing. The Senate Budget Committee had an official meeting today called a markup. A markup is when a committee votes on a bill being considered by that committee. The phrase markup comes from the ancient practice of suggesting changes to the chairman who has presented the bill to the committee. And so, if you're lucky, the chairman will mark up the bill with your changes. That process takes place through the formal introduction of amendments to what the chairman has presented and what Budget Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham presented to the committee. Seemed really strange to Democrats after hearing Elon Musk go on and on and on for weeks now about cutting trillions of dollars in spending from the $7 trillion budget of the federal government. The Republican budget resolution presented by Lindsey Graham to the committee today with full Republican support, includes a $4 trillion increase in the debt ceiling, a $4 trillion increase in the national debt. Donald Trump and the Republicans want to increase the national debt by $4 trillion while complaining about $57,000 at USAID. And one reason they need to increase the national debt is that Republicans actually want to increase spending.

[Melanie Stansberry]

I have been hearing from the President and Mr. Musk about military spending. And what they have pointed out is that over the last, I think it's seven years, every independent audit that the Pentagon has not been able to make an independent succeed in doing an independent audit of the Pentagon. And I think, according to Mr. Musk, according to President Trump, there are waste and fraud within the Defense Department of hundreds and hundreds of billions of dollars. So it's kind of hard for me to understand that, given that reality, why anybody here would want to give the Pentagon and defense contractors another 150 billion. So I will be offering an amendment to deal with that.

[Rachel Maddow]

That's right. Republicans want to increase defense spending by more than triple the entire USAID budget. They want to raise defense spending from $800 billion to $950 billion. Upwards of a trillion dollars. While Elon Musk claims that he has to starve children because we wasted $57,000 in Sri Lanka. As I reported here last night, Elon Musk offered absolutely no proof of any wasteful spending anywhere in the federal government while he was towering over Donald Trump in the Oval Office yesterday and humiliating Donald Trump by creating the most vivid image of presidential subservience ever captured by a camera. Do we have that image in the control room that we can put up here now? I think you all remember it. Maybe we don't. The Democrats in Congress are trying to ask Elon Musk real questions now about what he's really finding, if anything, in the powerful House Ways and Means Committee yesterday, the Republican majority had no interest in using their power to question Elon Musk. Tom Suozzi asked a panel of expert witnesses if they knew what Elon Musk was doing in the government.

[Tom Suozzi]

What kind of access does Mr. Musk and his team have? What kind of changes have they been making to the computer programs? How many of those changes to computer programs are permanent and how will that affect people going forward? Mr. LeBlanc, what's he doing? I don't know what he's doing. You know what he's doing? No, Mr. Ladwin, you know what he's doing.

[Rachel Maddow]

It'll be inappropriate, me for coming to.

[Tom Suozzi]

Him know what he's doing. We have not Looked at that, Ms. Olson.

[Sheldon Whitehouse]

No.

[Tom Suozzi]

Does anybody here know what they're doing? Does anybody know what kind of keystrokes, changes they're making and they're permanent? Does anybody know what their backgrounds are? Does anybody know what they're doing with the information that they have and how they're using it?

[Rachel Maddow]

That's Democrat Tom Suozzi of New York. No one in the room could answer any of those questions. Not a single Republican member of the committee could answer any of those questions. Donald Trump couldn't answer those questions. Elon Musk probably cannot answer all those questions himself because he probably doesn't know what all of his very strange assistants are doing with their keystrokes. But what we know they're not doing is finding 1%, even 1%, of any budget that is being misspent. For Elon Musk to find 1% of the USAID budget that is being misspent, he would have to find $400 million, not $57,000. And if he found 1% that is being misspent, which he hasn't anywhere, that would be no reason to shut down an agency. The Defense Department has failed seven audits in a row. And by failed, I mean they've been unable to account for very significant amounts of money. That's before you even get into identifiable spending that you think might be wasteful. This is money they actually cannot account for. And it is trillions of dollars over time that the Defense Department has no idea what happened to it. And not one office in the Defense Department has been closed down because of that. Not one person has ever been fired because of that. Not one. Elon Musk fired thousands of people working for and with usaid. Thousands of people doing humanitarian work around the world. Democrats want Elon Musk to do what every member of the Cabinet has to do. Come to the Congress and explain himself. House Republicans had a hearing today, chaired by, of all people, Marjorie Taylor Greene, to review the so called improper payments that Elon Musk is supposed to be finding. But Elon Musk didn't show up. He wasn't asked to show up, not by the Republicans. And no improper payments were displayed or identified in any way. The top Democrat on that committee, Melanie Stansberry, said this.

[Jeanne Shaheen]

Why is a private citizen being given access to this system? We know they're trying to shut down payments, they're trying to shut down agencies. What's next? Are they going to shut down your Social Security payments? We don't know because they have no oversight. And Elon Musk will not come in front of this committee. And in fact, the treasury folks are saying this is the biggest insider threat they've ever seen in the history of the agency. So we are sounding the alarm. And no matter how many executive orders that Donald Trump signs or how many tweets the VP sends, you cannot rewrite the Constitution. And we are going to hold you to account. So let me close by saying this directly to Mr. Elon Musk. We are well aware that you are eager to engage with members of Congress on social media, but we're not here to play. If you have serious desire to engage in democracy and transparency, we welcome you to the Oversight Committee. Come and testify in front of the American people under oath, because we want to know what you're up to. So if you're interested in talking to us, then please join us here in the People's House in the House of Representatives.

[Rachel Maddow]

Joining us now is Democratic Representative Melanie Stansbury of New Mexico. She is the top Democrat on the new Committee on Government Efficiency. First of all, let me just start with the name of your state. Donald Trump is trying to rename the Gulf of Mexico. Obviously, when he finds out the name of your state, he's going to want to change it to, I don't know, New. New Arizona or New Texas or something. I don't know. Are you ready for that?

[Sheldon Whitehouse]

I hope that he'll study a little history because the border crossed us and in fact, New Mexico was part of Mexico until 1848. And so I hope he learns his history before he comes for us, because we're not going to stand for that.

[Rachel Maddow]

As was the entire southwest of the United States part of Mexico. Congresswoman Stanberry, of course, the one witness, the one witness that that hearing needed today was Elon Musk.

[Sheldon Whitehouse]

Yeah, I mean, okay, first of all, the Republicans have created this new subcommittee of the Oversight Committee, and it's a regular standing subcommittee now of Congress. And the entire premise that Republicans explained was to investigate government efficiency, fraud, waste and abuse. And the number one witness that should have been in of the committee was Elon Musk. But not only did they not have him come and testify, when we tried to invite and then subpoena him to come testify last week, they went out of their way to block him and shield him from having to testify in Congress. And I think, as you've noted tonight, as was obvious yesterday in this bizarre press conference, if you'll call it in the Oval Office, Elon Musk is running roughshod, unfettered, lawlessly across our federal government with, as far as we can tell, not only no oversight by Congress, but no oversight by the White House itself. And he's hacking federal systems, breaking the law, shutting down federal agencies, harassing and firing federal employees, freezing federal payments and hacking these sensitive data systems. And we literally have no idea what he's doing, what his motives are and what he's up to, because no one is holding him accountable. And so we want him to come in front of the American people and to testify under oath in front of the Oversight Committee. And I think we made that very clear today.

[Rachel Maddow]

Well, he pretended to be for transparency and the free exchange of information in the Oval Office yesterday with the White House press corps lobbying the softest of softballs very politely in his direction. But have you, can you just invite him? Obviously you don't have subpoena power, but have you attempted to just invite him to come and testify?

[Jim Farley]

Well.

[Sheldon Whitehouse]

Well, we did. So today I publicly announced that he's invited to come and testify in front of the committee. Democrats would love to have him come testify in front of the committee. And actually, we do have subpoena power. And Representative Connelly made a motion last week to subpoena him, and Republicans actually block that motion in the committee. So I find it very strange that, you know, the Republicans are eager to talk up all of this work. The richest man in the world, a successful businessman who's somehow streamlining the federal government, but they don't want him to come in front of Congress and actually answer real questions about what he's finding. And here's the thing. I want to really make sure that we emphasize this. The treasury payment systems that he and his Silicon Valley buddies are hacking and which the courts have shut down actually tell you nothing about improper payments. And so what we really want to know is what is he doing inside of our most sensitive data data systems? We're talking about systems that pay our soldiers, that keep our government running, that pay your Social Security. There is absolutely no reason why any private citizen should have access to those data systems, more or less a private billionaire who bought his way into the White House. So we have a lot of unanswered questions, and we want to have Elon Musk in front of the committee answering to the American people because millions of Americans are asking for him to be accountable for what he's doing.

[Rachel Maddow]

Representative Melanie Stansberry, thank you very much for joining us tonight.

[Sheldon Whitehouse]

Absolutely.

[Rachel Maddow]

Thank you. Coming up, Senator Sheldon Whitehouse was in the Senate Budget Committee markup today. He discovered that the Republicans want to increase the national debt by $4 trillion. And the Republicans on the committee actually voted to do that today. Senator Whitehouse joins us next.

[Unknown Speaker]

Republicans clearly do not want to talk about a looming crisis headed for our economy and our budget, but it's not hard to see how the dominoes fall.

[Rachel Maddow]

Joining us now is Democratic Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, a member of the Senate Budget Committee, the Senate Finance Committee and the Senate Judiciary Committee. He's the top Democrat on the Environment and Public Works Committee. Senator, now you know how I spend my day. I watch markups in the Budget Committee, which of course, what a life you've got, which go on for quite a while. But, you know, I love the detail of it. So I've just been dying for this budget resolution to come out to actually see. Okay, it's official. They want to increase the debt, just the debt alone, by $4 trillion.

[Unknown Speaker]

Yeah, you've got to put three pieces together. You've got the House budget resolution, you've got the part of the Senate budget resolution that they passed today. And then you've got the next stage that is lurking in the months ahead. But what we can absolutely know now is that they refuse to protect Medicare benefits. They're ready to lift the debt limit by $4 trillion. And the benefit of most of that new borrowing is going to go to provide huge new tax cuts to billionaires and big corporations who already pay disgracefully low tax rates. And the worst part of all of this is that those billionaires and big corporations funded Trump's campaign. So this is political payback of the worst kind. There's no merit to saying that a billionaire who pays almost no taxes already should have their taxes lowered still, except that the billionaires were behind Trump. So it's really a disgraceful piece of activity that we're watching. And if the pieces come together, it's going to be even more clear what they're up to.

[Rachel Maddow]

And they could have easily inserted a provision to the Finance Committee instructions saying, do not cut Social Security, do not touch Medicare, which Donald Trump promised in the campaign. He wouldn't cut those two things, but they are clearly headed for cuts in this budget resolution.

[Unknown Speaker]

Yeah. And the good news is that what you saw in the Budget Committee today was dedicated to the Budget Committee's task, which is just giving instructions to each of these committees to hit a certain number relative to the federal budget. That's just a number to actually make it law. They have to go to those committees, and Democrats are going to be in those committees calling this out with their actual plans in front of us. We won't have to surmise they will be doing it in plain view, and the American public will have a good look at how the public treasury is being looted by Republicans to make billionaires even richer and pay even less taxes.

[Rachel Maddow]

Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, thank you very much for joining us tonight.

[Unknown Speaker]

Of course.

[Rachel Maddow]

Thank you. Coming up, that important testimony that Republican senators did not hear and that Elon Musk really needs to hear. That's next. The top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Jeanne Shaheen, organized an informal hearing today about Elon Musk's destruction of the United States Agency for International Development, which was attended only by Democratic senators. No Republican senator wanted to hear the testimony of the expert witnesses. And so no Republican senator had to hear what Elon Musk, the richest person in the world, is doing to the poorest children in the world.

[Declan Walsh]

For any of you that have traveled to see USAID programs in action, you may have seen a nutrition center treating severely malnourished children. It is truly a horrific sight. Children particularly susceptible to disease in environments with poor water and sanitation, maybe without access to vaccines, are particularly vulnerable to wasting what we call the severest forms of malnutrition. It takes children quite quickly. Even those children who don't die can have permanent brain damage. But the miracle of malnutrition is it can be treated quite inexpensively and quite easily, largely with products that are produced using peanuts grown in the United States, produced in manufacturing facilities in Georgia and Rhode island, highly nutritious food that are a gift from the American people to severely malnourished children around the world.

[Rachel Maddow]

It doesn't always work. There are children and babies who sometimes have lost too much in their battle to stay alive so that even that remarkable peanut formula doesn't work and cannot pull that baby back from the jaws of death. And when you watch a mother silently waiting for it to work as a nurse holds her baby in her arms, it changes you. I've seen that only once in my travels in Africa, and I don't know that I could bear seeing it again. You don't know right away if it's going to work. The baby might seem to recover a bit and then lose the ability to process nutrition. The mothers know that because they've seen it happen to other children. It's something Elon Musk has obviously never seen, even though he is from the continent that has suffered the most from famine and malnutrition during his lifetime. Here's more from Sarah Charles, the former head of USAID's Bureau for Humanitarian Assistance.

[Declan Walsh]

The administration's dismantling of USAID and abandonment of global staff and partners has devastated the world's poorest and undermined American security. This disaster, entirely of the administration's making, threatens to destabilize already fragile regions, jeopardizes American livelihoods and weakens our national security. Immediate impacts include In Sudan, where civil war rages, communal kitchens serving 800 people in Khartoum have ceased, while 1.6 million people in Darfur are cut off from water and sanitation. In Burkina Faso, where people have fled Islamists, 300 people in the besieged city of Jibo lack clean water. 57,000 civilians, many of them elderly, are now without heat or food. On Ukraine's front lines in northern Ethiopia, 700,000 people have been abruptly cut off from food and water, including 50,000 children cut off from emergency nutrition support, each one of them someone's child.

[Rachel Maddow]

Declan Walsh has seen all of this. He is literally the best reporter in the world whose work I am aware of. Declan Walsh is the chief Africa correspondent for the New York Times, and he will join us next. New York Times Chief Africa Correspondent Declan Walsh reports in Kenya alone, at least 40,000 healthcare workers will lose their jobs. USAID officials say the United States also provides most of the funding for two large refugee camps in northern Kenya that house 700,000 people from at least 19 countries. One Kenyan researcher told Declan Walsh Kenya has enough drugs to treat people with HIV for over a year, but the nurses and doctors to treat them are being let go and the clinics are closing. Joining us now from Nairobi, Kenya, is Declan Walsh, chief Africa correspondent for the New York Times. And Declan, I just want to open the microphone to you. I'm afraid of cornering you with a question that's too narrow for your focus and range of experience on this recently. What are the latest updates we should know about what's happening there?

[Jim Farley]

Thanks, Lawrence. Well, look, in broad terms, the impact of effectively the dismantling of U.S. aid and the freezing of much of U.S. foreign assistance, particularly in Africa, has been sweeping. It's been immediate and in many cases for recipient communities, it's been absolutely devastating. You heard a reference in the earlier clip from Sarah Charles in her testimony today where she talked about those soup kitchens in Sudan in the capital Khartoum that have closed down. About two thirds of 600 odd soup kitchens that were feeding 800,000 people until just a couple of weeks ago have now ceased operations because of this. Khartoum is appallingly a capital city that is in the throes of a famine, a famine that is spreading across Sudan and that is probably one of the largest, if not the largest the world has seen in decades. That's the sharpest, one of the most stark examples. But there are many, many more across many countries in Africa, as mentioned there, you've got hundreds of thousands of people living in refugee camps in Kenya and in neighboring countries that rely entirely or in part on American funding in order to have shelter or things like clean water. And of course, it's important to mention what's probably been America's greatest success in foreign aid over the last decades, which is a program known as PEPFAR that has provided life saving drugs to people with HIV, hundreds of many millions of them over the last 22 odd years. It's estimated to have saved about 26 million lives. And right now that program is in great doubt. Although Secretary of State Rubio has issued or at least declared a waiver for certain kinds of life saving assistance, folks within the aid community say that in many instances it's been difficult if not impossible to obtain those waivers.

[Rachel Maddow]

How widespread is the knowledge there that it is the richest person in the world. Who is doing this to the poorest people in the world?

[Jim Farley]

I think that's starting to filter through to people now as the prominence of Elon Musk in American policy generally and certainly in foreign policy is really being felt. I think Elon Musk's identity as someone who was born in South Africa, even though he's now an American citizen and is certainly an African, was somewhat muted, I would say, in the African, African countries in recent years. I mean, he had been rising to prominence through his network, his Starlink network, which has expanded across the continent and has become prominent particularly in countries that don't have great Internet access to start with. But I think for many people it is truly shocking that this person who's amassed so much wealth is, as he's put it himself, taking to the wood chipper a foreign assistance program that is entirely, largely, if not entirely focused in many countries on certainly the poorest people. As you say, what does it do.

[Rachel Maddow]

To people emotionally to have to turn away from this work that they have been doing, knowing that they've been doing life saving work?

[Jim Farley]

It's really hard to describe the extent of what's happening here in Nairobi, where I live. This is one of a handful of cities across the continent that are hubs for the aid industry. And I can see it in the communities around me where you've got folks not just who were employed directly by USAID are now facing the prospect of uprooting their families and moving home immediately. But actually the ripple effect is much, much broader. It's going into UN agencies that receive a lot of this funding. It's also going into international NGOs like CARE, Mercy Corps, International Rescue Committee. It's also going, it has to be said, into a number of faith based organizations that have also been huge recipients of American aid and really been a crucial channel for getting that aid to people in the hardest hit areas, countries like South Sudan. Those folks are absolutely reeling. People are seeing not just people losing their jobs, but in fact an entire aid sector being reshaped by this assistance, by this decision. Because you see, USAID is by far the world's largest single donor. And so when you take that effectively out of the equation, or at least reduce it significantly, the impacts are severe and really still being measured. We're just going to see in the weeks ahead how this plays out.

[Rachel Maddow]

Declan Walsh, thank you very much for joining us tonight. You are our eyes and ears there. Your reporting in the New York Times is invaluable. Thank you very much. Please join us whenever you can.

[Jim Farley]

Thank you very much, Lawrence. It's a pleasure.

[Rachel Maddow]

Thank you. We'll be right back. New York Times. African Bureau Chief Declan Walsh gets tonight's last word.