by WorldTribune Staff / 247 Real News October 5, 2025
$3.6 million for cooking and dance workshops for male prostitutes in Haiti.
$3 million for circumcisions and vasectomies in Zambia.
These are among the “ridiculous” foreign aid projects Democrats are demanding be reinstated in the budget before they will agree to end the shutdown, Louisiana Republican Sen. John Kennedy said.
Kennedy said Democrats are holding the country “hostage” after they blocked a bipartisan stopgap funding bill, prolonging the shutdown into next week.
“We just eliminated money for all forms of media in the Affordable Care Act. Now those are the demands. I’ll mention one more. Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez got very, very upset, as did the socialist wing of the party, when the president sent over what’s called a rescission package. Basically, President Trump just said we want you to take some stuff out of the budget that we think is wasteful, and we did,” Kennedy said. “And that upset the congresswoman. She’s entitled to be upset if she wants to, but that really upset the socialist wing of the party. And so we took out, and here’s what they want us to put back in.”
Kennedy said other projects Democrats are demanding the U.S. government fund include:
• Over $4.2 million for LGBTQ projects in the Western Balkans and Uganda.
• $6 million to subsidize Palestinian media outlets.
• More than $833,000 for transgender people in Nepal.
• $500,000 to purchase electric buses in Rwanda.
• $300,000 to sponsor a pride parade in Lesotho.
Meanwhile, the Trump Administration said large-scale layoffs of federal workers could be imminent if ongoing talks with congressional Democrats fail to yield a resolution to the shutdown.
White House National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett said Sunday that President Donald Trump may order widespread layoffs if it becomes clear that negotiations are not going anywhere.
“There’s still a window for Democrats to come to the table,” Hassett said on CNN’s State of the Union. “But if it becomes obvious that things are absolutely going nowhere, then, unfortunately, we have to consider all options.”
The shutdown began on Wednesday.
Trump told reporters at the White House on Sunday that Democrats will be responsible for anyone who gets laid off.
“I call them Democrat layoffs,” Trump said. “We have a record-setting economy. We have a record-setting country. Prices are way down. We’re doing better than the country has ever done and the Democrats hate seeing that. It’s up to them. Anybody laid off, that’s because of the Democrats.”
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