(NewsNation) — The White House announced it would stop paying for Politico subscriptions after right-wing figures falsely claimed the United States Agency for International Development has been subsidizing the media outlet.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Wednesday that she was “made aware of the funding of USAID to media outlets, including Politico” and that the media outlet was paid more than $8 million by the federal government, which was “essentially subsidizing subscriptions to Politico on the American taxpayers’ dime.”
“The DOGE team is working on canceling those payments now,” she added, referring to President Donald Trump’s new Department of Government Efficiency led by tech billionaire Elon Musk.
What is USAID, and why might the Trump administration shut it down?
Why was Politico being paid?
The money Leavitt points to covered the entire federal government’s subscriptions to the news outlet’s services, namely Politico Pro, which offers more in-depth reports, according to USASpending.gov.
For example, $44,000 of the payments to Politico came from USAID for subscriptions to E&E, an energy and environment publication that is paywalled, in 2023 and 2024, The Dispatch reported after reviewing the purchases.
In July 2020, the Department of Health and Human Services paid $73,857 for a Politico Pro subscription licensed for 37 users. The department exercised options to extend the contract in 2021 and 2022 and eventually increased its subscription to 49 users in 2023 for $130,185, according to the outlet.
Catholic aid group downsizes by nearly 50% amid USAID freeze
The Department of Interior purchased a subscription to E&E in September 2021 for $200,000, which it has been extending since.
All federal agencies combined spent $8.2 million last year on Politico Pro, the outlet reported.
Where did the false claims come from?
The false claims appear to stem from a post by conservative commentator Kyle Becker, who connected a Semafor story that showed Politico staffers hadn’t been paid over a “technical error” that was subsequently fixed to a USASpending.gov page that shows Politico received $8.2 million.
“Fun Fact: @Politico received USAID funds,” Becker posted on X. “Everything makes sense now.”
The erroneous claims caught wind of several right-wing figures before getting on President Donald Trump’s radar.
“LOOKS LIKE BILLIONS OF DOLLARS HAVE BEEN STOLLEN AT USAID, AND OTHER AGENCIES, MUCH OF IT GOING TO THE FAKE NEWS MEDIA AS A “PAYOFF” FOR CREATING GOOD STORIES ABOUT THE DEMOCRATS,” Trump said in a social media post.
What is DOGE, and what’s it doing?
Politico CEO Goli Sheikholeslami and Global Editor-in-Chief John Harris sent a memo to staffers saying “we welcome” the conversation around the value of Politico’s subscriptions and that the company had “never been the beneficiary of government programs or subsidies” and that the “overwhelming majority” of subscriptions come from the private sector,” reported Axios.
Other news outlets that federal agencies have subscriptions to could be on the chopping block.
Since becoming the head of President Donald Trump’s new Department of Government Efficiency, Musk has launched a widespread effort to eliminate USAID.
Musk alleged that USAID funding was used to launch deadly programs and called it a “criminal organization.”
Trump, under Musk’s recommendation, ordered USAID funding to be paused for 90 days, and many of the agency’s staff were fired or put on administrative leave, which largely halted the agency’s work.
