The week before Christmas, the razor-thin Republican majority in Congress tried three times to pass a Continuing Resolution (CR) to keep the government from shutting down. They finally succeeded on the third try after purging the bill of funding for a variety of programs that are critical to the welfare of the American people and to national security.

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While passing the stripped-down version of the legislation was necessary to avoid falling off a fiscal cliff, the deliberate malfeasance of the GOP leaders in the House of Representatives must not be overlooked or dismissed as standard operating procedure. Even though it was standard for the incompetents who comprise the MAGA caucus in Congress.

SEE THIS: DO-NOTHING CONGRESS? The Republican House of Representatives is the Least Productive Ever

One of the programs that was excised from the CR that is not getting much attention was the funding for a State Department Agency responsible for monitoring foreign disinformation. Al Jazeera reports that…

“A leading United States government agency that tracks foreign disinformation has terminated its operations, the State Department has said, after Congress failed to extend its funding following years of Republican criticism.

“The Global Engagement Center (GEC), a State Department unit established in 2016, shuttered on Monday at a time when officials and experts tracking propaganda have been warning of the risk of disinformation campaigns from US adversaries such as Russia and China.”

If anyone is wondering why Republicans would oppose an agency that is intended to keep track of nefarious foreign operatives spreading lies about matters of national security, just ask the old question that is posed whenever something untoward occurs in government: “Who benefits.”

In this case it is fairly clear that Donald Trump is among the prime beneficiaries of the shuttering of the GEC. He has received an incalculable amount of help from Russian disinformation and propaganda in all three of his campaigns for president. That includes promotion of his “Big Lie” that the 2020 election was “rigged and stolen” from him, as well as their pushing disparaging lies about President Biden and Vice-President Kamala Harris in order to sabotage their electoral prospects.

What’s more, Trump has long been a staunch advocate of Russia and his hero, Vladimir Putin. While he frequently insults American leaders in the most vile terms, he has never said anything derogatory about Putin. He doesn’t want to cut off the flow of support he gets from Vlad. Which is why he wouldn’t want a government agency pointing out all of the dishonest propaganda that emanates from Russian sources. And his MAGA minions in Congress cooperated by defunding the agency.

It’s notable that Fox News covered this story with their typical heaping of right-wing bias. Their headline declared that the “State Department’s ‘Global Engagement Center’ accused of censoring Americans shuts its doors.” However, the “accusations” referenced in Fox’s headline all happen to be from extremist MAGA Republicans, including Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, Trump’s pick for deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller, and Elon Musk, who was quoted in the article saying that the GEC is the “worst offender in U.S. government censorship & media manipulation.”

These are the cheerleaders of “America First.” Well, make that “Blame America First.” Like Trump, they routinely shoot down the United States, particularly when it is in conflict with Russia or China. And they have both ideological and financial reasons for doing so. Trump and Musk are heavily invested in China’s economy. The last thing they want is an agency exposing the malevolence of their political and business partners.

When the Trump administration is officially sworn in, it will have people in place to further their fealty to their foreign propaganda outlets. Most notably, Trump’s nominee to be Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, who has zero experience in intelligence, but is notoriously close to Russian operatives. And there is also Trump’s choice to run the CIA, John Ratcliffe, who worked with Trump and Russian intel to smear Hillary Clinton. And then there’s Kari Lake, Trump’s nominee to run the U.S. Agency for Global Media, who promises to turn the Voice of America, which it oversees, into America’s propaganda network.

It shouldn’t surprise anyone that Trump’s allies in Congress would seek to obstruct American efforts to expose Russian and Chinese disinformation. It shouldn’t surprise anyone, but it should worry everyone. Trump’s affinity for foreign dictators is well known. And now Congress is helping him to cover up how his foreign pals are continuing to help him by giving them a free hand to spread propaganda. Hopefully independent media watchdogs will be up to countering their efforts, because in Trump world they will be rooting for them.

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