CNN anchor Boris Sanchez was stunned Thursday after Rep. Buddy Carter (R-Ga.) pushed a bizarre claim on air about how the United States Agency for International Development spent its money.
The claim arrived when Sanchez asked Carter if cost-cutting crusader Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency had the authority to “supersede” him and his colleagues after the billionaire’s associates reportedly looked to shut down USAID payments using the Treasury Department’s payment system.
“Of course, it doesn’t. Look, the aid that was the U.S. aid that was cut off should’ve been cut off. I mean, $15 million for condoms for the Taliban and —,” said Carter before Sanchez interjected.
“Sir, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa,” the CNN anchor said.
“Hold on, $47,000 to a transgender opera in Colombia? Please,” Carter added.
″$15 million for condoms for the Taliban?” Sanchez asked.
“That’s what we hear and that’s what they discovered. I mean—,” Carter said.
“Are you conflating things?” Sanchez said. “Are you talking about the $50 million that was supposedly meant for condoms in Gaza?”
The claim from Carter echoes one made by Rep. Brian Mast (R-Fla.), chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, who alleged in a video Tuesday that $15 million stemming from “radical, far-left” State Department grants and USAID money went to condoms for the Taliban.
The contraceptives weren’t for the Taliban but, rather, for Afghan citizens, The Atlantic’s Russell Berman noted.
The claim is similar to another debunked one pushed by President Donald Trump, who said his administration “identified and stopped $50 million being sent to Gaza to buy condoms for Hamas.”
Carter insisted he wasn’t conflating things.
“This is the type of thing that they’re finding and this is the kind of thing that we want him to find. There is inefficiency. When you have a government as big and bloated as we have, you’re going to find inefficiencies like this,” said Carter who supported the need for the nonofficial “department.”