A $25 million program that offered taxpayer funds to promote LGBTQ ideology abroad has been removed from the State Department website by the Trump administration.
The Biden administration State Department’s Global Equality Fund posted its final grant application solicitation on Jan. 6, offering $2.1 million to help LGBTQ people “mitigate and recover from violence and restrictions on human rights and fundamental freedoms,” “eliminate laws which criminalize LGBTQI+ status and/or conduct,” and advance the fund’s goals in other ways.
In 2023, the Global Equality Fund invited projects led or supported by LGBTQ organizations and communities to apply to win awards of between $750,000 and $1.5 million. In 2021, the fund offered up to $1 million to LGBTQ “empowerment” projects in Africa, Asia, and the Middle East.
But on Jan. 20, President Donald Trump paused foreign aid for 90 days to assess “programmatic efficiencies and consistency with United States foreign policy.” Four days later, Secretary of State Marco Rubio halted spending on most existing foreign aid grants.
The stop-work order included grants and programs under the Global Equality Fund.
“The Department of State conducted a full review of foreign assistance programs, led by Secretary Rubio, to ensure efforts effectuate U.S. foreign policy,” the State Department press office told The Daily Signal. “Programs not advancing President Trump’s priorities were terminated.”
Trump issued executive orders prohibiting government-funded promotion of diversity, equity, and inclusion; radical gender ideology; and critical race theory.
The Global Equality Fund was removed from the State Department’s website, and it is now only available under a 2021-2025 archived content page.
The cuts to State Department foreign funding projects are part of the Trump administration’s wider effort to cut “waste, fraud, and abuse” from the federal government.
The Department of Government Efficiency is “finding levels of fraud and waste and abuse like, I think, nobody ever thought possible,” Trump has said.
The Global Equality Fund was “dedicated to advancing and defending the human rights and fundamental freedoms” of LGBTQ people around the world, according to the former webpage on the State Department’s website.
The State Department’s Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor managed the global LGBTQ fund with the support of foreign governments, businesses, and foundations, including the Human Rights Campaign, one of the largest LGBTQ rights organizations.
During its 10-year tenure, the Global Equality Fund distributed more than $100 million to more than 100 countries in order to “achieve LGBTQ equality.”
“There is not enough appreciation or understanding for how much funding the federal government provides for causes associated with the political left,” David Ditch, senior analyst in fiscal policy at Economic Policy Innovation Center, told The Daily Signal. “This problem ramped up during the Biden administration, and even though President Trump is pushing back, Congress must take action as well.”
