Vice Ranking Member Amo Leads Members Calling Out Rubio for Letting Foreign Aid Go to Waste 

WASHINGTON, DC –  House Foreign Affairs Vice Ranking Member Gabe Amo (D-RI) and 9 House Democratic Colleagues are calling out Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s waste of foreign aid bought with federal funds. The Members are demanding answers about contract freezes that risks foreign aid expiring or being destroyed and wasting taxpayer dollars. 

Excerpts from the Members letter: 

“Now, months into the foreign assistance funding freeze and the termination of most foreign assistance programs, we are alarmed about the status of the supplies purchased for those now terminated programs. Medicine, food, educational supplies, and other foreign assistance commodities were purchased using taxpayer funds. Without the contracts to implement these programs, these supplies are at risk of expiring or being destroyed, which is a complete waste of taxpayer funds.”

“Amid all the chaos caused by cancelling foreign assistance funding and programs, the question remains of what will happen to the supplies and commodities that were purchased for foreign aid programs prior to this administration’s termination. At the beginning of the foreign assistance funding freeze in early February, there were reports of nearly $500 million worth of food aid rotting at our ports and hundreds of thousands of dollars’ worth of medical supplies stuck in warehouses.”

“Will you commit to prioritizing providing these supplies and commodities originally purchased for now-terminated foreign assistance programs to other U.S. foreign assistance programs or, if none are available, provide these supplies to allies or organizations providing similar programs?”

Read the full letter here.

The letter was signed by Representatives Ami Bera (D-CA-06), Ed Case (D-HI-01), Madeleine Dean (D-PA-04), Jonathan Jackson (D-IL-01), Julie Johnson (D-TX-32), Seth Magaziner (D-RI-02), Sarah McBride (D-DE-AL), Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC-AL), and Dina Titus (D-NV-01).

###