“This organization is very clearly interfering in the domestic politics of a lot of countries, including our own”

Baku, February 5, AZERTAC

“It seems that President Trump and Elon Musk are catching up with the Azerbaijani government and recognizing that there are real problems in USAID that need to be addressed,” Michael Doran, Senior Fellow at the Hudson Institute told AZERTAC.

“USAID ceased to be simply an arm of American foreign policy, and it became a tool in the global progressive movement, and is, I think, very clearly interfering in the domestic politics of a lot of countries, including our own,” he underlined.

“Well, there's going to be a big fight, a big fight, because USAID is created by law. It's a statutorily constituted entity. So the president cannot simply eliminate it with the stroke of his pen. Also, he's striking at the progressive movement by going after USAID. So it's going to be a big fight. There's no way to predict exactly how it's going to. But I think the cover has been taken away, and we can all see in the USAID now and see that, at the very least, it is really in need of reform,” Michael Doran added.

Melahet Najafova

AZERTAC special correspondent