Despite an ongoing war in the Middle East, open borders flooding in millions of illegal immigrants, a worsening drug crisis, and increased risk of terrorist attacks in the U.S., President Joe Biden apparently has other priorities. According to an Epoch Times investigation of government spending, in the last three fiscal years, $4.1 billion “in federal money from taxpayers” has been put towards LGBT initiatives both within the U.S. and across the globe.
In June, Family Research Council published a report that tracked the Biden administration’s foreign policy LGBT priorities. Written by Arielle Del Turco, director of the Center for Religious Liberty, and Chris Gacek, senior fellow for Regulatory Affairs, it revealed data similar to the Epoch Times’s investigation. FRC’s report also pointed out that the Biden administration’s “ideological colonialism” often “strains our relationships with other countries and diverts U.S. attention from focusing on other human rights issues.”
As the authors state, “LGBT-identifying persons are already (rightly) protected by international human rights treaties by virtue of their personhood, not their sexual orientation or gender identity.” This is unlike countries including (and not limited to) Brunei, Iran, Mauritania, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, and Yemen, where identifying as LGBT is illegal, and, in some cases, the death penalty is imposed. Nevertheless, the White House is “pushing LGBT-specific policies around the world” that is not only distracting but “a coercive attempt to change foreign cultures and laws from afar and displaces human rights like religious freedom.”
As Del Turco and Gacek argue, the Biden administration is doing this through specific department grants, an emphasis on Pride Month, recognizing “LGBT-oriented international days,” creating gender-neutral passport options, and multiple other ways outlined in the report, which concludes are all a “misuse of resources,” harms the relationship the U.S. has with its allies, and ignores the laws that already protect human rights.
Ultimately, “The mark of this ideological push is widespread, and the harms will be as well,” the report read.
To provide further insight, Del Turco commented to The Washington Stand, “Sadly, the Biden administration has systematically infected nearly all aspects of our foreign policy apparatus to push LGBT ideology across the globe.” She continued, “Under Biden, Pride Month is celebrated at embassies, LGBT issues are included in the State Department’s annual Human Rights reports, the government observes LGBT commemoration days, and the State Department and U.S. Agency for International Development fund LGBT activism abroad. This type of international activism is alienating to many American allies in the developing world that have more conservative or traditional value systems.”
She added that it is also “inherently condescending.”
As for the $4.1 billion directed to LGBT priorities in foreign policy, Del Turco said, “Most American citizens have no idea” the U.S. government has wasted so much money “on not only useless but deeply harmful programs in the United States and around the world.” “LGBT issues remain hotly contested,” she pointed out, “and there is no nationwide consensus on many LGBT policies,” yet the fact that the Biden administration still insists on using taxpayer dollars to aid this “radical agenda is deeply disrespectful to a large portion of Americans.”
The bottom line, Del Turco said, is that “the administration is essentially trying to fund cultural change with the taxes of hardworking Americans that wouldn’t normally be interested in funding LGBT activist groups.”
Sarah Holliday is a reporter at The Washington Stand.
