The US humanitarian relief agency being shut down by Elon Musk and Donald Trump has been funding the BBC’s charity to the tune of $3million of American taxpayers’ money each year, we can reveal today.
The complete closure of USAID, which President Trump has said is ‘run by radical lunatics’, would blow a giant hole in BBC Media Action’s annual budget.
BBC Media Action is the BBC’s international development charity and it trains journalists and produces programmes that are broadcast in some of the world’s poorest regions.
It funds a range of projects in 30 countries and 50 languages across the world, from advising with the United Nations on media disinformation to mentoring journalists in Africa on climate change and ‘changing perceptions’ about the Covid-19 vaccination.
The charity, which is celebrating its 25th anniversary, says its work is ‘building stronger democracies’, making a ‘safer, more habitable planet’ and creating ‘more inclusive societies’ – especially for the disabled and LGBTQI+ people.
Last year USAID gave BBC Media Action $3.23million (£2.58million) of US taxpayers’ money, making it the second largest donor to the British-based charity. In the previous 12 months USAID donated $2.35million (£1.89million) to fund projects in Afghanistan, Kenya, Myanmar, Bangladesh, Nigeria and other nations.
But some critics have questioned whether all its work qualifies for humanitarian aid funding from the US government, which ramped up financial support considerably while Joe Biden was in the White House.
America’s billionaire ‘first buddy’ Elon Musk has led a civilian review of the federal government with Trump’s go-ahead and decided to shutter USAID and absorb it into the US State Department.
It came as we revealed how tens of millions of US taxpayer dollars are being spent by USAID on some shocking and woke projects, including a Peruvian trans comic book programme, $2.5 million for electric vehicles in Vietnam and $500,000 to expand atheism in Nepal.
There was even cash for the Chinese lab in Wuhan where COVID-19 is believed to have originated from.
Donations from the US agency to BBC Media Action increased markedly while the Biden administration was in power, totalling more than $6million of US taxpayer dollars in recent years.
USAID gave BBC Media Action around $445,000 (£358,000) after Joe Biden entered office in 2020. But this has exploded to over $3million in 2023/24.
In the last 12 months its key projects have included work in Nepal working with influencers and high-profile individuals on a series focused on gender-based violence and online harassment.
There was a Hygiene and Behaviour Change Coalition project, with radio, TV and social media content in Ethiopia and in Kenya the charity mentored more than 16 broadcast partners, ‘supporting them to tackle issues including climate change and preparedness for extreme weather’.
There was work with the UN on disinformation and work to help young Nigerians ‘make informed decisions about the COVID-19 vaccine and adopting measures to prevent HIV and HPV’.
USAID’s closure will cause a major budgetary headache at a time when its income is dropping across the board.
A BBC Media Action spokesperson told us: ‘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 per cent 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’.
Its total income in 2023–24 was £32million, down £3million and income from donors decreased to £25.2million from £27million a year earlier. Fundraising income decreased to £6.6million from £7.7million in 2022–23.
It is run separately from the BBC and is not funded by licence fee payers but is chaired by Fran Unsworth, the BBC’s former director of news.
The charity linked to the BBC sparked controversy in 2018 when it revealed it had sacked six staff for sexual misconduct.
Mr Musk has led a civilian review of the federal government with President Trump’s approval and decided this week to shut USAID down.
But the potential cutting of funding overseas in a move that will in turn give a bloody nose to the BBC, which he has been highly critical of calling it ‘government funded media’.
In 2023 he also humiliated a BBC reporter and accused him of lying during an interview where the journalist James Clayton stumbled when asked to name incidents of hate speech on Twitter, now known as X.
Yesterday Elon Musk and President Donald Trump shut down the embattled government agency tasked with humanitarian relief overseas after they agreed the organisation was a ‘ball of worms’.
If all its funding is cut it will hit many charities, including the one run by the BBC.
Elon Musk has been locking horns with the BBC recently.
In 2023 the BBC was labelled ‘government funded’ on Twitter but later changed it to ‘publicly funded’ after a complaint.
The Twitter owner then accused a BBC reporter of lying during an interview in a row over whether incidents of hate speech are increasing on his social network.
Mr Musk was asked by US tech journalist James Clayton how he would respond to claims that there are not enough staff at Twitter to police rising hateful content.
But he challenged the reporter to give him examples of such content – and when Mr Clayton declined to do so, Mr Musk accused him of spreading a ‘false’ claim.
The Twitter owner told him: ‘I’m asking for one example and you can’t give a single one…. I say sir that you don’t know what you are talking about.
‘You cannot give me a single example of hateful content, not even one tweet. And yet you claimed that hateful content was high. That is false, you just lied.’
Mr Musk has been accused of declaring war on the UK Labour Government.
He said Sir Keir Starmer should be put in jail for failing to take proper control on the issue of gangs of often Asian men raping white British girls in cities across the UK.
There are also reports of a vendetta with Sir Keir’s lieutenant Morgan McSweeney, who set up an organisation called The Centre for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH), launched when Jeremy Corbyn was leader.
But last year The Spectator reported on leaked documents that revealed that the CCDH had listed its strategic priorities and one of those was ‘Kill Musk’s Twitter’.
Trump and Musk’s call on USAID has caused chaos.
Staff were shocked when they woke up on Monday morning to emails instructing them to stay out of the agency’s Washington DC headquarters.
‘It became apparent that it’s not an apple with a worm it in,’ Mr Musk said of the six-decade US international aid and development agency.
‘What we have is just a ball of worms. You’ve got to basically get rid of the whole thing. It’s beyond repair.
‘We’re shutting it down,’ he said in the audio-only appearance on X.
The Tesla and SpaceX boss noted in the announcement on his social media site that he spoke with Mr Trump about the agency and they ‘agreed we should shut it down’.
As of 2016, USAID reported that it had 10,235 employees on its payroll.
Its budget for the 2023 fiscal year was around $40billion, which is less than 1 per cent of the federal budget.
USAID provides development and assistance in about 130 countries with these funds.
For this fiscal year, the President’s budget request was $28.3billion in foreign assistance.
USAID staffers said they tracked 600 employees who reported being locked out of the agency’s computer systems overnight.
Those still in the system received messages to their work emails saying ‘at the direction of Agency leadership’ the headquarters building ‘will be closed to Agency personnel on Monday, February 3.’
Copies of the email show that replies were sent to Gavin Kliger, one of the six young engineers working for Mr Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), which appears to be operating under the White House Office of Personnel Management (OPM).
The website for USAID was also shutdown as of Monday morning.
The official government website for USAID and any former links for the site’s webpages now shows a browser error message: ‘This site can’t be reached.’
The development came as a White House official yesterday said Mr Musk is working for Mr Trump as a ‘special government employee’.
He also has a government email address and office space in the White House complex, the official added.
And the source said Mr Musk does not receive a salary for his work, and under federal guidelines, it is unlikely that he will need to file a public financial disclosure report.
Mr Trump signalled his approval of Mr Musk’s work on Sunday evening after returning to Washington from a weekend in Florida.
‘I think Elon is doing a good job. He’s a big cost-cutter,’ the President said.
‘Sometimes we won’t agree with it and we’ll not go where he wants to go. But I think he’s doing a great job.’
Over the weekend the Trump administration placed two top security chiefs at USAID on leave after they refused to turn over classified material in restricted areas to Musk’s government-inspection teams, according to a US official.
Members of DOGE eventually gained access on Saturday to the aid agency’s classified information, which includes intelligence reports, the former official said.
Mr Musk’s DOGE crew lacked high enough security clearance to access that information, so the two USAID security officials – John Voorhees and deputy Brian McGill – believed themselves legally obligated to deny access.
The current and former US officials had knowledge of the incident and spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to share the information.
Mr Musk previewed the shut down earlier on Sunday when he attacked the agency in a post to X after Trump claimed it was ‘run by radical lunatics.’
‘USAID is a criminal organization,’ Mr Musk, who has become the president’s most powerful backer, wrote without providing evidence or proof of why he makes the claim.
He added, ‘Time for it to die’ – and followed that up with multiple additional posts about the agency.