Witness Will Tell House DOGE Panel How Terrorists Got $122 Million from USAID

The lobby of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) headquarters in Washington on Feb. 3, 2025. Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images

WASHINGTON—House DOGE Subcommittee Chairman Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) and other members of the panel will hear details on Wednesday about how $122 million in approved U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) funding was given to radical Islamic terrorist groups, including affiliates of Hamas, Hezbollah, and al-Qaeda.

Middle East Forum (MEF) Executive Director Gregg Roman said he will testify that “there’s a fox loose in the henhouse of our foreign aid system” before the panel’s Feb. 26 hearing focusing on “America Last: How Foreign Aid Undermined U.S. Interests Around the World.

“This problem began under the Obama administration, grew under the Biden administration, and now requires immediate action to halt dangerous mismanagement and a fatal moral confusion,” Roman said in a statement made available to The Epoch Times.

That USAID is directing tax dollars to terrorist groups and their affiliates that are committed to the destruction of the United States and its allies is not merely mismanagement, according to Roman.

“We’re not just talking about waste, fraud, and abuse—this is a national security problem,” Roman said. “Every misdirected dollar destabilizes conflict zones and puts American lives at risk.”

The MEF is a Philadelphia-based nonprofit think tank that focuses on defending American interests across the Middle East.

Two other witnesses will be from The Heritage Foundation—Max Primorac, a former USAID official who is a senior research fellow for the conservative think tank, and Tyler O'Neill, managing editor of Heritage’s Daily Signal media outlet.

Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk joins President Donald Trump during the signing of an executive order in the Oval Office, on Feb. 11, 2025. Andrew Harnik/Getty Images

The DOGE Subcommittee is part of the House Oversight and Accountability Committee chaired by Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.). The DOGE panel was formed in response to President Donald Trump’s creation of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) overseen by Tesla and SpaceX entrepreneur Elon Musk.

DOGE has dispatched hundreds of mostly young digital “whiz kids” to conduct forensic audits of federal spending at all federal departments and agencies. Among the first agencies to be examined was USAID.

“What the DOGE team has uncovered with USAID is shocking, but it’s just the tip of the iceberg,” Greene said in a statement announcing the hearing.

“For decades now, the federal government has been sending billions after billions of dollars to push left-wing ideology, fund radical extremist groups, and usurp the will of the people abroad and here at home.”

Greene will discuss at length during questioning by members of the panel the multiple groups with terrorist links that received portions of the $122 million in U.S. funding. The links were confirmed by MEF investigators through U.S. government documents, USAID records, and other publicly available information sources.

Among the groups is the Christian relief agency World Vision, which in 2014 sent funds it received from the U.S. government through the Islamic Relief Agency to a group formed by Osama bin Laden as a precursor to al-Qaeda. The money was approved despite protests from a USAID whistleblower. 

Another such group is Helping Hand for Relief and Development, which MEF investigators found was connected with the 2008 attacks by a Pakistani-based Islamic terrorist group that killed 164 people in Mumbai, India.

Other groups benefiting from USAID funding include Lebanon’s Jamal Trust Bank, which is linked to Hezbollah, and Bayader & Unlimited Friends Association (UFA), which is connected to Hamas, according to government records examined by MEF investigators. 

Roman will encourage the panel to seek a Department of Justice (DOJ) investigation to determine and prosecute the USAID officials responsible for the $122 million going to terrorist groups.