Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced Tuesday another round of spending cuts.
Rubio posted on X that the State Department was canceling 139 grants that would have cost U.S. taxpayers $214 million. Rubio said, "The American taxpayers should not be funding misguided programs like 'Building the Migrant Domestic Worker-Led Movement' in Lebanon or 'Get the Trolls Out!' in the United Kingdom."
Rubio said his mission is clear, "We are cleaning up the mess the previous administration left and rebuilding an agency that's focused on putting America First."
As a stand-alone figure, $214 million is a lot of money for anyone to consider, but it's not even 1% of what Rubio and President Donald Trump are preparing to cut from the department in the next fiscal year budget. As much as $28.4 billion is planned to be slashed from spending, including more cuts to USAID, the government agency that has been responsible for large foreign aid support programs that were supposed to build America's stature overseas.
Many of USAID's employees have been placed on leave as the Trump administration decides how best to restructure the parts of the agency it wants to keep intact and at what spending levels.