RIA Novosti and Russia Today have been spreading their message despite competition from media outlets funded by USAID and Western sanctions pressure, the Financial Times has said.
In an article published on Thursday, the British daily outlined the hit various media outlets would face from President Donald Trump’s crackdown on the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), Washington’s primary means for funding political causes abroad.
A number of USAID projects were focused on “countering” major Russia media outlets such as RIA Novosti and Russia Today, whose news coverage was “spreading on social media despite Western sanctions,” the newspaper said.
According to FT, the agency spent around $100 million on funding programs in Russia in 2023. Programs in Moldova received $309 million while around $1.7 billion was spent on Ukraine.
The US president froze most US foreign aid for a 90-day review shortly after his inauguration. USAID has subsequently seen a number of its projects suspended, and Trump has said he wants the agency shut down.
Without funding from the agency, many NGO media outlets around the world are struggling to stay afloat, FT wrote.
According to French NGO Reporters Without Borders (RFS), 9 out of 10 media outlets in Ukraine relied on donations and USAID as their primary donor, with many already announcing that they’ll have to shut down.
Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova noted that Trump’s crackdown on the agency vindicated Moscow’s 2012 ban on its activity in the country.
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“We said that this is not an agency for aid, assistance and development,” the spokeswoman stressed in a press briefing on Thursday. “This is a machine for interference in internal affairs, a mechanism for changing regimes, political systems, and state structures,” she said, adding that the agency had acted outside the realm of Russian and international law.
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