S.A. McCarthy for Real Clear Investigations:
The Biden administration is fraying relations with some allies and generating pushback from Congress by spending millions of taxpayer dollars to promote the woke ideology abroad that has stirred controversy at home since President Biden took office.
In a "national security memorandum" shortly after his swearing-in, Biden ordered all federal agencies with dealings abroad not only to protect LGBT rights in the face of discrimination and violence but to actively advance them. His State Department has said one of its goals is to "embed intersectional equity principles into diversifying public diplomacy and communications strategies" in relations with other nations.
U.S. ambassadors around the world have translated those words into action, championing LGTB rights in countries that oppose them; funding performances that feature drag queens; and holding diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) seminars.
The State Department would not provide a list of initiatives and programs connected to these goals or how much money it is spending. Recent reports estimate nearly $5 million has been spent abroad on LGBT programs alone, and U.S. senators including Republican J.D. Vance of Ohio are holding up appointments of new ambassadors over concerns about exporting "woke" ideology.
I'm frankly shocked the figure isn't $1 billion. But I bet they hide the numbers -- I bet huge amounts of time and resources are spent on Rainbow Propaganda, but it's just called "advancing humanity" or some bullshit.
The $5 million just covers what is specifically earmarked for direct expenditures on woke causes and direct donations to woke foreign organizations.
Vance criticized what he called the "injecting" of "personal politics" into the U.S. foreign service, saying: "You can call it 'extreme left,' 'woke.' To me it's leaning toward cultural progressivism in a way that alienates half of our country and, frankly, it probably alienates about 80 percent of the countries these guys are going to represent us in front of."
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Among the State Department initiatives are a $10,000 grant to a Portuguese LGBT activist group to finance a film festival featuring drag performances, incest, and pederasty. It also provided $20,000 to support a series of drag shows in Ecuador.
A $300,000 State Department grant to Botswana aimed "to promote greater social acceptance of LGBTQI+ persons, including among influential religious groups and traditional groups" who preach or teach that homosexuality is immoral: Roman Catholics, most evangelical Christians, Muslims, and Orthodox Jews. Earlier this year, Republican scrutiny pressured the State Department to cancel drag shows it had been hosting on U.S. military bases.
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The U.S. embassy to the Holy See posted its Pride flag on social media, disregarding the Catholic Church's longstanding position against homosexuality. Criticized for, in the words of Republican Rep. Warren Davidson of Ohio, "flying flags that are hostile to the doctrine of the Catholic Church," Ambassador Gina Abercrombie-Winstanley, the State Department's top DEI officer, defended the decision, saying the embassy did not need to coordinate with or seek the Vatican's permission: "We are a sovereign nation and we make our own decisions."
According to a tally by RealClearInvestigations, 118 U.S. embassies tweeted or retweeted posts celebrating Pride Month in June.
But endless "pride" is only one prong of the State Department's efforts to make the US a hated laughingstock. The other prong is pushing DEI trainings and initiatives -- including in mostly-black countries.
But the promotion of LGBT ideology is only one part of the State Department's broader push for DEI abroad. When State Department DEI officers managed a Pride event at the U.S. embassy in Trinidad and Tobago, Ambassador Candace Bond said one of the conference's goals was to establish "an inclusive DEI framework within their [Trinidad's] organizations." To that end, the State Department funded a three-day DEI training program.
Read the whole thing, and weep.