By Bethany Blankley | The Center Square contributor
(Worthy News) – Congress and federal agencies wasted more than $1 trillion of taxpayer money in 2024, according to an analysis published by U.S. Sen. Rand Paul, R-KY, who has long called for fiscal responsibility and the end of waste, fraud and abuse of taxpayer money.
Wasting taxpayer money and uncontrolled spending has made the national debt worse, he argues, which this year surpassed $36 trillion.
“Americans are paying $892 billion in fiscal year 2024 on Uncle Sam’s credit card,” he said, referring to the interest paid on the national debt.
In Paul’s Festivus Report 2024, he says “members of both political parties in Congress voted for massive spending bills, filled with subsidies for underperforming industries, continued military aid to Ukraine, and controversial climate initiatives. As Congress spends to reward its favored pet projects, the American taxpayers are forced to pay through high prices and crippling interest rates.
“Members of Congress continued to send “Americans’ hard-earned money to foreign countries, funding endless wars, all while STILL ignoring our wide-open southern border,” he said.
Highlights of the report include the federal government spending $10 billion “on maintaining, leasing, and furnishing almost entirely empty buildings,” and more than $7 million on various “magical projects.”
The U.S. Department of State appears to be a top agency waster of taxpayer money, Paul notes. Highlights include the agency spending:
- nearly $5 million on influencers;
- $3 million on ‘Girl-Centered Climate Action’ in Brazil;
- $2.1 million for Paraguayan Border Security;
- nearly $900,000 to the Royal Film Commission to produce movies in Jordan;
- $500,000 to expand the U.S. Embassy in Ethiopia’s “#USInvestsInEthiopians social media campaign to a larger national public relations campaign Bibbidi-Bobbidi-Boo”;
- $345,434 on football engagement to counter terrorism,
- $330,000 to censor conservative media;
- more than $250,000 to Bosnia to fight “misinformation;”
- more than $123,000 to teach Kyrgyzstan youth how to go viral;
- more than $108,000 on a non-functioning hotel;
- more than $32,500 for breakdancing.
Other examples Paul cited as wasteful spending include the U.S. Department of the Interior spending $12 million on a Las Vegas pickleball complex and more than $720,000 on wetland conservation projects for ducks in Mexico, according to the report.
Also notable in the report was the U.S., Department of Health and Human Services awarding a $2 million grant to study children looking at Facebook ads about food and nearly $420,000 on a “Depressing Study of Lonely, Starved Rats” to determine if lonely rats seek cocaine more than happy rats.
The Department of Energy spent “$15.5 billion to push Americans toward electric vehicles they don’t want.” The National Endowment for the Arts spent $365,000 to promote circuses in city parks, awarded the Bearded Ladies Cabaret a $10,000 grant to support a cabaret show on ice skates focused on climate change, and since 2015 has awarded $385,000 for art displays on the High Line.
The U.S. Treasury Department granted a failed trucking company a $700 million pandemic-era loan; the National Science Foundation spent nearly $290,000 “to ensure bird watching groups have safe spaces.”
The U.S. Department of Agriculture spent $20 million on the Fertilize Right Initiative to advance fertilizer use in Pakistan, Vietnam, Colombia, and Brazil.
The Agency for International Development spent $20 million on “Ahlan Simsim” a new Sesame Street show in Iraq; the U.S. Navy is set to waste almost $90 billion on ineffective Navy vessels, the report notes.
Copyright 1999-2026 Worthy News. This article was originally published on Worthy News and was reproduced with permission.
More Worthy News
Senior European intelligence officials see little chance of ending Russia’s war in Ukraine this year, despite President Donald J. Trump’s claim that U.S.-brokered negotiations have brought a peace deal “reasonably close.”
British police raided two properties linked to former Prince Andrew on Thursday and detained the 66-year-old royal on suspicion of misconduct in public office, escalating scrutiny over his past association with the late U.S. financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
Christians in Pakistan’s Punjab province were searching Thursday for an abducted minor girl, days after the provincial governor signed legislation raising the legal marriage age to 18 and criminalizing child marriage as a non-bailable offense.
The U.S. trade deficit edged slightly lower in 2025 but remained the third-largest on record, underscoring the scale of America’s global trade imbalance even amid sweeping tariffs imposed by President Donald Trump.
The United Kingdom will not allow the Pentagon to use British-controlled bases to launch potential military strikes against Iran, according to a report by The Times of London.
President Donald Trump on Thursday unveiled what he called a historic new diplomatic framework — the “Board of Peace” — during an inaugural meeting at the U.S. Institute of Peace, announcing billions in pledges for Gaza reconstruction and signaling that a major decision on Iran could come within days.
President Donald Trump is weighing an initial, limited military strike on Iran aimed at forcing Tehran to meet U.S. demands for a comprehensive nuclear agreement, the Wall Street Journal reported.