Investigation Shows How Much U.S. Taxpayer Money Went to China & Russia

Senator Joni Ernst (R-IA) and OpenTheBooks.com auditors said an investigation revealed that $1.3 billion U.S. taxpayer dollars have gone to China and Russia since 2017.

However, it’s likely the real number is greater than the official analysis claims.

Ernst and Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-WI) have spearheaded the Tracking Receipts to Adversarial Countries for Knowledge of Spending (TRACKS) Act.

They want full accountability and disclosure of taxpayer dollars sent to China and Russia.

“Senator Ernst and OpenTheBooks determined more than $490 million from U.S. grants and contracts were paid to organizations in China over the past five years and another $870 million were paid to entities in Russia,” OpenTheBooks claimed.

OpenTheBooks is “a nonprofit, nonpartisan watchdog group with the largest private database of government spending.”

PRESS RELEASE: OpenTheBooks and U.S. Sen. Joni Ernst Tracked Over $1.3 Billion of U.S. Tax Dollars Sent to China and Russia, Promises Accountability for Every Penny@SenJoniErnst @everydimeonline https://t.co/gdUnnaZbRP

— OpenTheBooks (@open_the_books) June 1, 2023

OpenTheBooks listed some of the projects in China and Russia paid by U.S. taxpayers, according to the investigation.

Some of these projects in Russia and China funded by taxpayer dollars already tracked down include:

• $58.7 million from Department of State, including $96,875 for gender equality through exhibition of New Yorker magazine cartoons
• $51.6 million from Department of Defense, including $6 million for tech support of the military “deployment and distribution command” software – delivering equipment and supplies anywhere our military is deployed, even though the DOD Inspector General warned the Pentagon about using Chinese IT companies on DOD projects
• $4.7 million to a Russian company for health insurance that was sanctioned by the U.S. in 2022
• $4.2 million from Health and Human Services, including $770,466 to a state-run lab in Russia to put cats on treadmills
• $2.4 million on Russian alcohol and addiction research
• $2 million funneled to China’s state-run Wuhan Institute of Virology to conduct dangerous experiments on bat coronaviruses and transgenic mice
• $1.6 million to Chinese companies from National School Lunch Program, which means taxpayer dollars from the CARES Act meant for American farmers went to Chinese ag exporters
• $1.45 million for pandemic virus tracking in Russia
• Subsidies for the Russian space program by funding the Russia Space Agency and vendors

Fox News aired a report on the findings:

Read the transcript below:

Joni Ernst senator from Iowa had this to say it is gravely concerning that one no one in Washington can actually account for Millions sent to Russia and China for pointless project but I have the receipt.

I’m shining a light on the reckless spending so bureaucrats can no longer cover up their tracks and taxpayers can know exactly what their hand hard-earned dollars are funding. I guess the problem I would have with this Angel is that a lot of Republicans are suddenly talking about this but when we had control of all of the government. They didn’t have that same stance. Well when you look at the numbers and we put up what our debt is and the numbers just tick and tick and tick and it’s more more digits than we can even count or we can even you know fathom look at that that those are your tax dollars being spent right now.

So Joni Ernst worked with this non-profit transparency group called OpenTheBooks and together they looked at this new analysis of data from usspending.gov which was between 2017 and 2022 to see just how your funds were is crazy. Look 6 million went to and this is all money that went to China and went to Russia six million in tech support to China of U.S military software that helps with equipment and supply delivery. Joni Ernst has a problem with that because she’s a vet and she said she flagged it she said it should be especially concerning to Americans because the DoD Inspector General has warned the Pentagon about using Chinese I.T companies on government projects.

How about that there’s uh sanctions on Russia we’re not supposed to be selling them anything like that 4.7 million for health insurance company? In Russia, are you crazy? 2.4 uh a million for alcohol and addiction and research in Russia 2 million China’s state-run we wanted students. So we still haven’t learned we’re sending money to.

We sent money to Wuhan 770 million for the state run lab in Russia. 775 oh yeah uh to put cats on treadmills. It’s a joke that sounds like the shrimp on treadmill right 100 000 approach injury quality awareness in China. I mean this is our state department is crazed with this whole gender awareness and same-sex marriage and trying to push that around the globe instead of and green projects instead of what’s in the best interest of America. Well so that’s unbelievable yeah and she’s saying she’s pledging to stop that and she and we did hear speaker McCarthy whether or not you like the bill or not we did hear him say we’re spending less next year than we will this year and that hasn’t happened in 10 years.

So the Reigns Act was originally supposed to cut two trillion dollars every single budget every single year. I’m sorry uh but unfortunately they were unable to pass it. They said the Senate would never vote for the president was never going to sign it but we were able to do is to get all this stuff sent back to the Appropriations Committee. That’s those are 12 Appropriations bill this is regular order.

So I’m just hoping when the Republicans get all levers of government we can take this to the next step where the Senate goes back to regular order as well as the White House. How infuriating is that though when you know you get up every day y’all are all getting ready for work right now putting your kids on the bus and going going to work many of you going to a job you don’t like and and you look at these numbers and you know that some of your tax dollar 50 of your paycheck probably is going to all of these pet projects in other countries?

All right uh a good Auto would certainly take place and they’re actually in the Inspector General uh Horowitz to get involved in the Department of Justice to look into this. Uh because someone signed off on it and and who would sign off on anything to Russia I mean we’re not supposed to be selling them t-shirts or China too when in particular.