Inside Geneva
Inside Geneva is a podcast about global politics, humanitarian issues, and international aid, hosted by journalist Imogen Foulkes. It is produced by SWI swissinfo.ch, a multilingual international public service media company from Switzerland.
Inside Geneva
Aid, cuts and consequences
On Inside Geneva, we take a deep dive into the United States’ cuts in foreign aid.
“In Colombia, they’ve just had to lay off 200 staff who were doing the demining in the south of the country. So, all of a sudden, these families have no work. And the alternative in the area, you know what it is: coca plants. So how is that in the US interest?” asks Tamar Gabelnick, director of the International Campaign to Ban Landmines.
“The freezing is not democratic. Congress has voted for some of these programmes and it's Mr. Trump, Mr. Musk, etc. who are cutting them out without the approval of Congress. So, legally, I don't see how they can do this,” says analyst Daniel Warner.
Why is Washington cutting something that is a lifesaver for vulnerable people worldwide, but costs just 0.2% of the US gross national product?
“President Trump and Musk will say that these cuts to USAID are about shrinking a bloated bureaucracy and getting rid of waste and fraud. But I'd say that this whole thing has more to do with ideology and politics,” continues Dawn Clancy, a journalist based in New York.
What happens when ideology cuts humanitarian aid?
“It's not just American isolationism. It's not just America first. There seems to be a quite deliberate undermining of fundamental freedoms,” says Imogen Foulkes, host of the Inside Geneva podcast.
“We don't have four years. The international legal framework and universal human rights are at a critical juncture and are being eroded, threatened and instrumentalised in unprecedented ways. Now is the time to step up,” says Phil Lynch, Executive Director of the International Service for Human Rights.
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Host: Imogen Foulkes
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This is Inside Geneva. I'm your host, imogen Foulkes, and this is a production from Swissinfo, the international public media company of Switzerland.
Speaker 2:In today's program, Late today, the US State Department suspended all foreign assistance around the world for at least three months.
Speaker 3:In Colombia they've just had to lay off 200 staff that were doing the demining in the south of the country. So all of a sudden these families have no work and the alternative in the area you know what it is Coca plants. So how is that in the US interest?
Speaker 4:The suspension freezing is not democratic. Congress has voted for some of these programs and it's Mr Trump, mr Musk, etc. Who are cutting them out without the approval of Congress, so legally, I don't see how they can do this.
Speaker 5:President Trump and Musk will say that these cuts to USAID it's about shrinking a bloated bureaucracy, it's about getting rid of waste and fraud, but I'd say that this whole thing has more to do with ideology and politics.
Speaker 1:It's not just American isolationism, it's not just America. First, there seems to be a quite deliberate undermining of fundamental freedoms.
Speaker 6:We don't have four years. The international legal framework and universal human rights are at a critical juncture and are being eroded and threatened and instrumentalised in some unprecedented ways. Now is the time to step up.
Speaker 1:Hello and welcome again to Inside Geneva. I'm Imogen Vokes and today I know we touched on this in our last episode but given the mood here in Geneva, we're going to have to talk about this more the consequences of the United States cuts in foreign aid, the actual closure, it seems, of US aid and what that is going to mean for humanitarian work worldwide. I've got two guests. Our listeners will be familiar with them, you've heard of them before. Our listeners will be familiar with them. You've heard of them before Danny Warner, here in Geneva, long-time analyst of all things Geneva international affairs, and Dawn Clancy, our friend of the podcast, based at the UN in New York. They are going to bring us their take on what's been happening. But first, as I said, we have talked about this but the consequences we are hearing more and more of. I'm just going to play you a little bit which I recorded in the last few days here at UN Briefings in Geneva, first from the UN Population Fund and then from UNAIDS, about what the consequences of this cut in US funding means.
Speaker 2:On 24 January, the US administration paused nearly all US foreign aid programs pending a 90-day review. In response, UNFPA has suspended services funded by US grants that provide a lifeline for women and girls in crises, including in South Asia. What happens when our work is not funded? Women give birth alone in unsanitary conditions. The risk of obstetric fistula is heightened. Newborns die from preventable causes. Survivors of gender-based violence have nowhere to turn for medical or psychological support. We hope that the United States government will retain its position as a global leader in development and continue to work with UNFPA to alleviate the suffering of women and their families as a result of catastrophes they did not cause.
Speaker 7:There is still a lot of confusion, especially in communities, how the waiver will be implemented and we're seeing a lot of disruption of delivery of treatment services, especially at the community level. So, for example, in Ethiopia, we have 5,000 public health worker contracts that are funded by US assistance and all of these, in all regions of Ethiopia, have been terminated and 10,000 data clerks very important in Ethiopia so that we continue monitoring and ensuring that people are on treatment. As UNAIDS, we estimate that if PEPFAR wasn't reauthorized between 2025 and 2029, and other resources were not found for the HIV response, there would be a 400% increase in AIDS death, that's, 6.3 million people, 6.3 million AIDS-related deaths that will occur in the future.
Speaker 1:So, welcome Dani, welcome Dawn. Pretty stark warnings. I'm going to come to you first, dani, because you know, as I do, the humanitarian community here in Geneva very well. What's the mood, what reactions have you been hearing?
Speaker 4:Well, it's pretty gloomy, imogen. People are really stunned, surprised and searching for what to do. I want to point out there are three levels of the problem. First is obviously, as mentioned, the recipients of the aid assistance in the field. The second, of course, is the people working for these organizations in the field. One organization, terre des Hommes, has had to lay off over 400 people working for them throughout the world.
Speaker 1:And let's just remind our listeners, Terre des Hommes, Swiss-based charity that works primarily with children in conflict zones or in transitioning from conflict.
Speaker 4:Right.
Speaker 1:I have seen their work, for example years ago in Albania. Excellent work.
Speaker 4:And the third, of course, is the people in Geneva. The estimate is about 350 people working in non-governmental organizations are out of a job or will be out of a job, and it's such an emergency that the Geneva government has proposed 10 million francs for 90 days to try to help some of these organizations. That's how bad it is.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean I would share that. The shock in Geneva we all expected, as we'll hear in some of our forthcoming interviews. We expected changes with the Trump administration, but not as savage as this Dawn. How's this going down in the United States? I mean, we heard from the UN Population Fund maternal health clinics in Afghanistan or UN AIDS. You know, hiv prevention among children. Are people at all aware of this?
Speaker 5:where they were talking about USAID and I would say, if you listen to that briefing, there's very little acknowledgement of what's happening on the receiving end of this USAID funding, freeze and layoffs and all the craziness that it's causing. So I would say that here in the States, especially with Republicans who back this kind of audit, they're not acknowledging what's happening on the Geneva end. You know, as Danny explained it, they're just talking about USAID is corrupt and it's abusing money and it's fraudulent and it's exporting woke leftist woke ideology all around the world.
Speaker 1:They're not acknowledging the other side of it, which is um, which is really interesting to hear and we should say there that at time of discussion, nobody has come up with any evidence to say that us aid is corrupt or fraudulent. What I will say is that its funding and the UN humanitarian community has made this clear, the US funding is absolutely crucial to humanitarian work worldwide. At the same time, what US taxpayers maybe don't quite know is that what the US spends on foreign aid is not very much. It's around 0.2% of its gross national income, which is, as a colleague of mine in the UK said, a rounding error. Not spending this money will make no difference to US taxpayers, and yet not spending it is life or death to some of the poorest people on the planet, and that debate just does not seem to be being had in the United States.
Speaker 5:You know, imogen. I would just add when you talk about evidence, I think that's a really important point of this, because we've had the White House Press Secretary, carolyn Leavitt, rattling off these programs that USAID supposedly supports about transgender plays in Colombia and transgender comic books in Peru, and they've shown no evidence. That's the White House press secretary, president Trump himself he gave an impromptu press briefing in the Oval Office yesterday. He did the same thing no evidence. That discussion isn't happening either, which is quite interesting.
Speaker 4:Danny, you want to come in, yeah one of the things that I find interesting is the suspension freezing is not democratic, with a small d, I mean. Congress has voted for some of these programs and it's Mr Trump, mr Musk, etc. Who are cutting them out without the approval of Congress. So legally I don't see how they can do this, and I do know there are certain court findings coming up which said that this can't be done. Now, whether the president obeys the court rulings is another problem as well, but democratically this doesn't fly.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's right, it doesn't. I mean it is a constitutional issue and that's another program is whether the US is now in some constitutional crisis. Is this actually a coup, which I've heard some people say? It's a bit chilling. Danny, I know I said the word coup, your ears pricked up On you go and then we need to move on and you started smiling.
Speaker 5:It's not about the coup.
Speaker 4:but I do want to make a comment early on about the organizations. The United States pays about 40% of all humanitarian assistance around the world and I do think that there should have been some anticipation and diversification of the donor funding, because now they're in a desperate situation. To find that amount of money is going to be extremely difficult and I don't see how they're going to do it. But they shouldn't have been so dependent on the United States.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I don't disagree with you, danny, there, but let's not forget that, although the US is the biggest contributor, as we said, in terms of its GNI, it's not contributing that much A country like Norway or Sweden, or even the UK. Uk is up at 0.5%. Some of these Scandinavian countries are up at 1% of their gross national income. So you know, and they're all facing the same economic headwinds. They all had to cope with COVID. They are all stepping up for Ukraine, another whole entire programme and listeners, we will be devoting ourselves entirely to that in a special episode next week.
Speaker 1:What I wanted to come back to, though, dawn, was saying this debate is not being had in the United States. Instead, there's a lot of accusation and slurs basically against USAID, and barefaced lies, like condoms for Gaza, which it turned out to be a complete lie and nobody's actually said sorry for. So one of the purposes of this program is to actually go a bit deeper into what USAID has been funding in the hope of providing some enlightenment across the pond, and one of the things which has also been cut pretty badly since this announcement of the freeze is demining worldwide Now. I've been talking to Tamar Gabelnik, she's head of the international campaign to ban landmines and they coordinate with demining groups all over the world, and I asked her how things had been and her reaction to these cuts.
Speaker 3:I think everybody was absolutely shocked by this. First of all, no one expected a global freeze in foreign aid across the board and certainly no one expected that it would affect the mine action sector, which has always had a lot of bipartisan support. So, yes, total surprise and no time to prepare or even do any kind of contingency planning.
Speaker 1:Could you give some specific examples of that? Things that have had to stop work, maybe?
Speaker 3:Well, most importantly, it's the demining, which means taking out basically deadly threats explosive threats that lie in the ground waiting for anybody to come along, and every mine that's taken out, every cluster munition, submunition that's removed means a life or many lives saved. So the United States gives around $310 million a year to mine action, which is about 40% of the global budget for international assistance to mine action. So having a budget cut by 40% overnight is going to have severe consequences. In countries like Ukraine. That's 30% of their budget cut overnight and they're stopping work. Now, are they? Yes, everyone was issued a stop work order. We were too, the coalition. We are advocacy, but we also do a research project. The US government funds part of that research project on exactly this the impact of clearance and on victim assistance and funding for mine action. So that was a big chunk of our budget gone overnight as well, but it's the life-saving work of the deminers that's really in question.
Speaker 1:Why is this happening, do you think? I mean, we expected some things from a new Trump administration, but this?
Speaker 3:Shock and awe. Let's cut, see what the reaction is and then maybe put it back. We're still hoping that there'll be a reprieve and then it won't last the full 90 days. I did hear a rumor this morning that at least one operation in one country was told that they could start working again, so maybe there's hope. I mean, president Trump is talking about going into Gaza, and that's a whole other subject that we won't get into now. But you're not going to be able to rebuild, no matter who's doing it, unless you clear all the unexploded ordnance first, and all that money is now halted.
Speaker 1:You were talking about. Some people are hoping, oh, maybe after the 90 days we'll be restored. Is that why some aid agencies are very quiet, that they think if they are kind of meek and patient things might get better?
Speaker 3:Definitely there is fear about retribution by President Trump and his administration. He obviously plays favorites. You do the most minor thing that he perceives as an affront and you're no longer in favor. Whether the people making the decisions lower down on specific demining projects will keep that in mind or not, I don't know, but yes, everyone is being extraordinarily careful not to ruffle feathers right now.
Speaker 1:Is there any way of appealing in language that the people who are making the cuts understand? I mean, I've often heard the case for demining is also a very economic one, that land can become productive again, economies can become productive again.
Speaker 3:Well, this gets into a much larger conversation about what's in the United States' interest and the perception of that among the United States' interest and the perception of that among the administration, lawmakers and the American public. Our opinion, as civil society working for the protection of civilians, is that it is in the US interest to exercise their influence soft power, bigger power by being a good actor and showing leadership, removing a daily threat to the well-being and to the life and the livelihoods of communities around the world. But yes, as you say, economically as well. You're not going to be able to refarm a field that's been covered in landmines unless you're sure there's no more mines there, because otherwise your tractor rides over something, be it anti-tank or even anti-personnel. And you're sure there's no more mines there, because otherwise your tractor rides over something, be it anti-tank or even anti-personnel, and you're in trouble.
Speaker 1:What feedback or messages are you getting from local NGOs on the ground? Because it's not just agencies situated here in Geneva with a lot of quite comfortable international staff. There's local staff all over the world doing the hard graft of this kind of work.
Speaker 3:Absolutely. The Cambodian government has said it will have to lay off 1,000 people. It's 93 teams. Just to give you an example, they said over the past year and a half or so they've taken out almost 30,000 landmines from the ground, 30,000 threats to people, civilians. The war is long gone there. We're not talking about soldiers, civilians that can walk in.
Speaker 3:Yes, yes, there is a responsibility of the US government in Laos as well, with the cluster munitions and the cluster munitions, or the subunitions that remain in Cambodia as well 17,000 of those and each of those has such an amount of explosive in it that often, if they go off, they'll kill not just the person that picked it up by accident, but people around. But another example in Colombia, we have a campaign member there and they've just had to lay off 200 staff that were doing the demining in the south of the country. So all of a sudden, these families have no work and the alternative in the area you know what it is Coca plants. So how is that in the US interest that these people that were doing something good for the community are now, probably in order to survive, having to go back to coca farms?
Speaker 1:Dani, we did hear from Dawn all of the kind of stuff that's being talked about in the United States, about fraud and corruption and spending money on nonsense. They say, Again, no evidence. Here we have Tamar with a clear eye on what the money is spent on and she also makes the point that something like demining in Colombia it's not just nice for Colombia, it's actually in the US interest.
Speaker 4:Well, I agree. I mean, it certainly is a question of status and prestige, and one of the things that Mr Trump doesn't follow is the Harvard professor, joe Nye's concept of soft power. Soft power is defined as getting someone to want to do what you want them to do. An easier definition Joe gave in Geneva was it's how a parent deals with an adolescent child. And the United States is now in competition with China, and China is spending billions around the world on its Silk and Belt Road initiative, and the United States AID is part of an image of the United States around the world. Places are not going to get American aid. They're probably going to ask China or someone else, which reduces American prestige and leadership, and I think that's something that the Americans should understand, if they understand the competition with China.
Speaker 1:Dawn. What do you think about that? Because I sense that the current administration for Trump is not interested in soft power. They're interested in strong manpower. But at the same time, trump has made a huge play about fentanyl and other drugs coming over the border. And there is Colombia, as Tamar so clearly says. You know the other option if we don't help and we don't get farmers land demined to grow their stuff, they'll go back to the drug barons and coca. Surely a transactional Trump? That argument might appeal to him.
Speaker 5:Yes, I think for a transactional Trump, that would make sense, but I don't think that that's the version of Trump that we're dealing with at the moment. You know, president Trump and Musk will say that these cuts to USAID it's about shrinking a bloated bureaucracy, it's about getting rid of waste and fraud, but I'd say that this whole thing has more to do with ideology and politics. I would say that for Trump and his Republican allies, this is about going after an agency that they see as part of the lunatic left. That's how Trump refers to the left often. Is the lunatic left Going after this agency and tearing it down? Because he sees American taxpayer dollars going towards these agencies that promote and export woke ideology? You know, like I mentioned before, well, imogen, you mentioned, you know, condoms for Gaza. That turned out to be not true, but now they're talking about condoms for the Taliban. So that's what I think this is about.
Speaker 5:If we were dealing with the transactional Trump, that would make sense, but that's not who we're dealing with. This is more ideological. That would make sense, but that's not who we're dealing with. This is more ideological. Going after the left, who Trump believes stole the election from him in 2020, going after the left who, you know, got Trump into the courtroom. So that's why I think, perhaps in Geneva maybe not that people aren't thinking about this in Geneva, but that's what I think is dominating this right now, geneva, but that's what I think is dominating this right now.
Speaker 1:That's quite petty, danny, though, isn't it Vengeance? And making hundreds of thousands of the world's poorest suffer because you want to get rid of a political clique that you see personally as a threat?
Speaker 4:He is who he is. He's from the Queens, I'm from Bronx. Maybe we understand that aspect of each other. But I wanted to add to what Dawn said. It's not just any bureaucracy. There's a difference between his attacking domestic bureaucracies and his gut feeling against anything international and especially multilateralism. So this is a combination of a bureaucracy and a foreign bureaucracy and I think that's part of his vengeance against some of the programs, but also his larger ideology against multilateralism, against the UN and anything that deals with that world.
Speaker 5:Yeah, absolutely, if I can just add to that that deals with that world. Yeah, absolutely, if I can just add to that yesterday Trump had a press conference in the Oval Office and he had just had a conversation with Putin and he was very serious about ending the war in Ukraine. People are dying, we have to end it. And then he went and he rambled for a little bit and then he got on this topic of USAID and his whole demeanor changed. He became more aggressive, he became angrier. I think the next project that he and Elon Musk has is they're going after the Department of Education and they're going to just completely cut it down, because I think Trump described it as a con job, the Department of Education. I don't know where he gets that from, but if you go back and look at that press briefing, what we're talking about here will be clearly illustrated this vengeance and this anger.
Speaker 1:So I personally find this quite concerning and dismaying because, although I've never been somebody who subscribes to, you know, america is the determiner of our freedom in the world. I've never really believed that and I do think Europe has made its own standards, which, unfortunately, the Americans because most of them don't travel don't know anything about. They might come over and find that we live quite well without them. Thank you very much, but where we're going with this now? It's not just American isolationism, it's not just America. First, there seems to be a quite what I fear, a quite deliberate undermining of fundamental freedoms, and that is another aspect in that I said to you at the start, we're going to look in depth at what these cuts mean, because they are also affecting human rights work worldwide. I talked to Phil Lynch from the International Service for Human Rights. Now they support human rights defenders in some of the most difficult, challenging parts of the world, including Russia, including China. Now here's what he had to say.
Speaker 6:We're supporting human rights defenders and democracy activists who are working on the front line in highly restrictive and repressive contexts. Places like China, like Venezuela, where the role of human rights defenders is absolutely critical in promoting justice, in promoting equality and in promoting good and transparent and accountable government that respects international law and is a responsible international citizen.
Speaker 1:You've put out a statement in the last couple of days saying that your organisation has been hit hard by the US funding freeze. What exactly have you had to do? How are you coping?
Speaker 6:The suspension of government funding has meant that we've had to terminate or to defer or to reduce a number of activities, particularly activities in support of human rights defenders working in some of the most highly restrictive and repressive contexts. We've also had to take a number of anticipatory cost-saving measures, which has reduced our overall capacity to support human rights defenders globally at a time of great need.
Speaker 1:Did you expect this from the United States? I mean, we all expected some changes with President Trump 2.0, but did you expect cuts as savage as these seem to be?
Speaker 6:No, I didn't, because the US, like all states, tends to act in its self lives. It also contributes very much to a more safe, secure and prosperous international order, which is to the benefit of the United States and all global citizens, frankly, who do you think's listening, though, in the United States?
Speaker 1:now I mean these terms international world order, etc. Etc. They just they don't seem to resonate across the pond anymore.
Speaker 6:Right? Well, I mean, I think it's absolutely imperative that they do. The United States is not an island. It can't exist in complete isolation and the United States, like all states, rely on an international order which is rules-based, which has some level of fairness. International order which is rules-based, which has some level of fairness, consistency, predictability, without which we descend to a complete might-is-right type situation, which frankly, undermines global peace and security.
Speaker 1:You talked about everybody having an interest in the rule of law. That includes international law. The problem is, every day seems to bring a new blow to it. We've seen the United States withdraw from the International Criminal Court and actually it introduced a whole raft of things which will punish anybody who engages with it. That could include you might even include me, as a journalist. What can we do?
Speaker 6:How can we stand up for this rules-based order to come together collectively and say we have a shared interest in international law, in the observance of universal human rights and in the rule of law and we're going to collectively speak out in defense of those principles and stand up and take concrete action where those principles are violated. And just by way of example, the sanctions announced by the Trump administration against the International Criminal Court constitute an interference in the international administration of justice. They constitute a violation of fundamental principles of international human rights law and international criminal law. And it's incumbent on states that support the international criminal justice system to collectively come together and say we're going to hold you to account as a perpetrator and we will adopt countermeasures and levy our own sanctions against individuals and institutions who threaten and interfere with the international administration of justice in this way.
Speaker 1:So you would counsel against saying we're just going to have to wait four years and be consorted out after that.
Speaker 6:We don't have four years. The international legal framework and universal human rights are at a critical juncture and are being eroded and threatened and instrumentalized in some unprecedented ways. Now is the time to step up and invest politically and financially in the international human rights system, because the stakes could not be higher and the counterfactual one in which the international human rights system is completely and utterly eroded is a counterfactual in which we all lose enormously.
Speaker 1:Phil Lynch is looking at a wider threat to our fundamental rights and freedoms. Coming from what used to be called the land of the free and the home of the brave Americans worry that these basic freedoms, which they have told us, they support and they're sharing with the rest of the world that they're being undermined.
Speaker 5:Yeah, I think if you're paying attention, you're scared or you're frightened, absolutely you know. Just going back on something that Danny said about soft power, trump isn't a soft power guy. I mean, anytime he describes anyone that he brings into his fold it's because they're strong and they're tough and they adhere to his motto of peace through strength. And I think that's what we're seeing is a turn away from international law I hate to say international norms, but I guess there's. There is a certain amount of diplomacy that countries use to interact with one another. That keeps things civil, but I see Trump going towards the, towards the mightier side, thinking well, this is what we're going to do. You know Europe, and if you don't like it, then I'm going to send troops into your country. I mean, that's probably probably a stretch. I shouldn't have send troops into your country.
Speaker 7:I mean that's probably a stretch I shouldn't have said that.
Speaker 5:No, but you know he's a strong man. He doesn't care about the law, it doesn't bother him to like steamroll over some court decision. He sees himself as being the strong guy that can sit down with Putin and make a deal.
Speaker 1:Well, I mean on the Swiss media. Today, my colleague, who is the Moscow correspondent for Swiss media, described it as I'll say it in German der folgenreiche Kniefall von Trump. Ie, he's prostrated himself in front of Putin and it will have consequences. As I said, listeners, we're going back to that next week because it's a whole other program Trump and Putin and Ukraine. But, danny, you have your hand up. We heard from Phil Lynch that we seem to be moving and Don hinted at it to a might-makes-right world.
Speaker 4:What we call hegemonic masculinity it to a might makes right world what we call hegemonic masculinity and the rule of law both in the United States and internationally is in great trouble, and there are certain fundamental values that we associate with the United States, we associate with the United Nations.
Speaker 4:My take on this to try to get some happiness and some kind of optimism is that Trump, since January 20th, is at the summit of his power. He thinks he can do whatever he wants to do, but the pendulum does swing and the courts are starting to come back against him. I think the population in the United States is going to also start moving against him Internationally. There's going to be blowback as well. So to me, the question is how long he can have this kind of absolute power with Elon Musk and when it will start to descend, how it will descend and what that will mean. I do think it's going to take a long, long time to come back internationally to before January 20th. These cuts are very strong and very deep and you can't just say tomorrow it's all going to go back to the way it was before, but I don't think this can continue indefinitely.
Speaker 1:So a note of semi-optimism, almost to end this program. I've got just to end a personal question for you both, because you're both American. I mean, we've heard a bit from Danny. He thinks it won't last forever. But how do you feel about it? I mean, I'm not American, but I was a student there. I'd spent first years of my life there and I do see, I do feel like we're witnessing a huge, huge change which probably won't be changed back very easily.
Speaker 5:Yeah, I agree, I am frightened, for sure. You know, during Trump's first presidency I kind of had the attitude like this is who was voted into office, we just have to deal with it, let's see what happens. But this time I feel much more frightened that we're headed in the wrong direction, not just with the US and our relationship with the rest of the world, but within the United States Domestically. What does this mean? I don't think that we're headed for civil war or anything like that, but I think our civil liberties, the things like free speech, I think all of that is going to be coming into question. And Trump has already signed an executive order that makes certain language prohibited.
Speaker 5:So things like that that will creep up on you. You know, won't be somebody outside your door with a gun, because you know here in the States we love our guns. I don't have a gun, but I'm just saying that's what I worry about, because it'll be slow and it won't necessarily be something that hits you in the face right away, but over time you'll say, hmm, I remember a time when I could say that in public and now I have to worry because you know, this police officer over here might question me. I mean, maybe that's being a bit dramatic, but I'm thinking of everything, danny, what about you?
Speaker 1:And maybe also from the Geneva, an American in Geneva perspective.
Speaker 4:I don't want to get too personal, imogen, but I've lived here for 52 years. There must be reasons why I left the United States. I'm depressed, I'm angry. I should have more distance from this, but I don't. And I've tried to speak about this and write about it.
Speaker 4:But it's terribly worrying, not just in terms of the United States, but in terms of the world. This is a tectonic shift in global politics and most of it is negative. On the other side, I get up every day with my American friends when we speak, and we're so privileged to live in Switzerland. Many of my friends have given up their American citizenship I haven't. But it is shocking, stunning. But in a sense it's not all that surprising. I mean, he did get 75 million votes the first time, and so there must be something going on in the United States. How long, as I said, how long that will last, I'm not sure. But if the price of eggs goes up in the United States, the price of gasoline goes up, then maybe people will start to say he's not coming through with what he said he would do. He has not reduced inflation, but I don't know how that's going to happen and when. But I do think the pendulum will start going down.
Speaker 1:And in the meantime, the humanitarian agencies that we have been focusing on this program have to wait. There's the 90 days. My feeling if I want to sum up again, it's a bit pessimistic is that I don't think that money's coming back after 90 days and I don't think that it will come back while this administration is in. And we all know that even when a different administration comes in, if somebody saved money, that money gets saved.
Speaker 4:There is an election coming up in two years and there will be determinant of how well he's doing with the general public. He could lose control of both the House and the Senate.
Speaker 1:Okay, well, on that note, sorry if it's been a bit pessimistic, but we did think it was important to bring to listeners more in depth what the basically execution of USAID and the US freezing of funds to foreign aid means to not just people who work in Geneva that's a pretty privileged lifestyle but the kind of programs they run all over the world, from demining to maternal health clinics in Afghanistan to support for human rights defenders in Venezuela or China.
Speaker 1:You've heard from all of them today. I hope it did enlighten some of our listeners or reinforce a feeling that maybe foreign aid is worthwhile, not just for the people who benefit directly, but for you taxpayers too, to make our world a more stable, peaceful and harmonious place. On that note, that's the end of this edition of inside geneva. My thanks to dawn and danny for analysis and don't forget to join us next week for our special on Ukraine. Is this a peace or is it a surrender? A reminder you've been listening to Inside Geneva from Swiss Info, the international public media company of Switzerland, and just before we go, here's some news about a new podcast series out now from Swiss Info.
Speaker 8:Hi, I'm Angela Saini, a science journalist and author. I've written four books exploring humanity's fascination with science as a solution to social problems with science as a solution to social problems and I'm the host of Lost Cells, a thrilling new investigative podcast that will make you question the promises behind private stem cell banking. This gripping podcast follows the stories of families from Spain, serbia, italy and many other countries as they embark on a global quest to find the one thing they need the most life itself. Will they succeed in their search for the stem cells that they pinned their hopes on? Tune in to Lost Cells, an original Swissinfo podcast. To find out, listen on Apple Podcasts, spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.
Speaker 1:That does sound pretty interesting. Do join Angela Saini with Lost Cells and, of course, do join us next time on Inside Geneva. We'll be back with that special episode on Ukraine on Monday, february 24th. Before that, if you want objective clarity about conflict, climate change, human rights, international law or any other of today's global challenges, then take a look at our previous episodes and subscribe to us. Wherever you get your podcasts, I'm Imogen Folks. Thanks for listening.
