Ex-USAID director confirms 'culture of corruption' within agency

Mark Moyar, a former director of the United States Agency for International Development, declared that the government agency has a "culture of corruption" that needs to be rooted out.

During a Wednesday interview with Fox News' Jesse Watters, Moyar described his experiences at the scandal-plagued USAID.

'Very effective at rebranding things.'

Over the past week, President Donald Trump's administration, especially Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency, has exposed some of the agency's wasteful spending. The administration is now pushing for a complete reorganization to prevent any more taxpayer funds from going toward anti-American initiatives.

Moyar, who began working at USAID in February 2018, explained to Watters that he was fired from his position after he tried to expose corruption within the agency.

He explained that during his orientation with USAID, he was asked to participate in a "privilege walk," a group exercise designed to visually demonstrate how various forms of privilege or disadvantage impact the life outcomes of individuals from different backgrounds.

Each participant begins at the same starting line. As a series of statements are read aloud, participants step forward when the statement positively applies to their lives, indicating some form of privilege, or step backward when it negatively applies, indicating a disadvantage.

Moyar stated that employees were assigned an alternative identity for the orientation exercise, and he was selected to be "a Scandinavian woman."

"They read lines like, 'I get discriminated against because of government services,' or, 'People don't like how I look,'" he told Watters. "I ended near the front. The indigenous woman with unwanted pregnancy and the male prostitute were at the other end. And then we talked about our privileges."

Moyar explained that USAID is "very effective at rebranding things," referring to the agency's wasteful spending habits.

As an example, Moyar stated that the agency started a feminist women's book club under the Obama administration, and it has since been re-designated as a counterterror program "because feminist women are key fighters in the battle against terrorism."

During his time with USAID, Moyar said he tried to report one of his subordinates for a "criminal conflict of interest." When he did so, he was informed that most employees were unwilling to report corruption within the agency.

"They didn't tell me why," Moyar told Watters. "I later figured out it's because you get in a lot of trouble."

"I was accused of publishing classified information," he continued. "They ultimately used that to fire me. Now, the people who were engaged in the corruption managed to hold on to their jobs."

He called the agency's accusations "bogus," stating that he has been fighting its claims in court for several years.

"There's a culture of corruption that says, 'If you are going to criticize anything corrupt, we are going to come after you,'" Moyar added.

He stated that USAID has historically refused to turn over information to the courts or Congress.

Moyar told Watters that the DOGE is doing a "good job" uncovering wasteful spending. However, he contended that exposing the depth of the agency's issues would require forensic accountants.

"It's probably going to take a long time because these bureaucrats have devised very crafty ways to hide money," Moyar said.

He noted that Trump's second-term administration has already been more diligent and efficient about cleaning out the agency than during Trump's first four years in the White House.

Moyar believes Trump is now using a more "heavy-handed approach" with USAID because bureaucrats managed to hide most of the wasteful spending through his first term.

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