by WorldTribune Staff, February 6, 2025 Real World News
DOGE is the gift that keeps on giving.
A curious thing happened at a certain media outlet after Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency blew the whistle on the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).
After the Trump administration froze the agency’s funding, Politico staffers reportedly did not receive their paychecks.
According to government spending tracker USAspending.gov, Politico received up to $27 million (and by some counts $32 million) from various federal agencies during the Biden-Harris years.
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said on Wednesday that the money given to Politico was spent on “essentially subsidizing subscriptions to Politico on the taxpayer’s dime. The DOGE is working on canceling those payments now.”
“This is a government effort to ensure that we are going line by line when it comes to the federal government’s books,” Leavitt added.
Politico received $44,000 from USAID last year, but was given millions more from other federal agencies, public records show.
As RedState’s Bonchie noted: “Politico has never disclosed those payments even as they’ve written pieces covering USAID, posing as unbiased arbiters of truth. That represents one of the biggest scandals in the history of the press. The United States government was funneling money to a left-wing news outlet that has repeatedly done the bidding of the Democratic Party.”
Meanwhile, The New York Times received $3.1 million in U.S. taxpayer funds, while the UK’s BBC received $3.2 million, according to USAspending.gov.
Trump wrote in a post to Truth Social:
LOOKS LIKE BILLIONS OF DOLLARS HAVE BEEN STOLEN AT USAID, AND OTHER AGENCIES, MUCH OF IT GOING TO THE FAKE NEWS MEDIA AS A “PAYOFF” FOR CREATING GOOD STORIES ABOUT THE DEMOCRATS. THE LEFT WING “RAG,” KNOWN AS “POLITICO,” SEEMS TO HAVE RECEIVED $8,000,000. Did the New York Times receive money??? Who else did??? THIS COULD BE THE BIGGEST SCANDAL OF THEM ALL, PERHAPS THE BIGGEST IN HISTORY! THE DEMOCRATS CAN’T HIDE FROM THIS ONE. TOO BIG, TOO DIRTY!
Were the millions a reward for obedience during the 2020 election?
Politico was among the first to push the anti-Trump “51 intel officials” propaganda regarding Hunter Biden’s laptop during the 2020 election.
BBC’s charity, BBC Media Action released the following statement on Feb. 4:
A free press is essential to freedom and democracy – and 75% of countries around the world do not have a free press. BBC Media Action supports local media around the world to deliver trusted information to people most in need.
Like many international development organisations, BBC Media Action has been affected by the temporary pause in US government funding, which amounts to about 8% of our income in 2023-24. We’re doing everything we can to minimise the impact on our partners and the people we serve.
As the BBC’s international charity, we are completely separate from BBC News, and wholly reliant on our donors and supporters to carry out our work.
Last month, two former Politico reporters confirmed the outlet protected Joe Biden prior to the 2020 presidential election.
In the USAspending.gov report, listed under a “disaster emergency fund,” over half a million dollars was paid from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to Politico for 37 “Politico pro subscriptions.”
Zero Hedge noted that Politico was sold to German media giant Axel Springer (which also owns Business Insider) for $1 billion in 2021:
“So 90% of ‘subscribers’ to left-wing publications like Politico are fake and ‘taxpayer funded’. And then using fake subs to artificially pump up revenue, Politico gets to sell itself to German propaganda giant Axel Springer for $1 billion.”
Related: Politico — conduit of leaked Supreme Court Roe draft — is brought to you by Soros, Facebook and Goldman Sachs, May 17, 2022
The taxpayer funding was exposed after staffers at Politico revealed on Tuesday that they hadn’t received their paychecks.
Politico told employees their paychecks were delayed due to a “technical error” which supposedly caused a “payroll issue.”
Staff at Politico did not get paid for the latest pay period. The company just sent several emails to employees saying it believes there was a technical error, and is looking into how to fix the issue. pic.twitter.com/PYcWYdbrEC
— Max Tani (@maxwelltani) February 4, 2025
POLITICO has a subscription called PoliticoPro, which costs around $10,000 a year. @politico should be transparent about how many of these pro subscriptions are government-funded.
Given the ludicrous cost, I’m guessing its upwards of 90%.
It seems to me the entire program is a…— Chris Tomlinson (@TomlinsonCJ) February 5, 2025
It’s not just the subscriptions: there are huge “ad contracts”, dinner parties DC throws itself under the guise of “media conferences”, sponsorships, etc all paid for by taxpayers.
Once done with Politico look at its spawn Axios, founded by Politico veterans https://t.co/ShM4zTbnyX
— zerohedge (@zerohedge) February 5, 2025
Timely: Defund Fake News
The American Free Press is Back!
Tip of the iceberg; USAID media scandal explodes: Politico, BBC, NY Times and more added by Editor Two on
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