Saving Kids’ Lives Isn’t “Woke”
Fifty-one Republican senators will have the blood of children on their hands.
“No wonder Sen. Ossoff tried to save UNICEF – they are just as woke as he is.”
That’s how Alabama’s senior senator, Tommy “Coach” Tuberville, defended his vote against an amendment to protect federal funding for the United Nations Children’s Fund.
A 70 year old man, a member of the United States Senate, wrote in an official statement to the press that UNICEF “are just as woke as [Sen. Ossoff] is.”
“American tax dollars should go to building bridges and roads, improving education, and getting homeless people off the streets in the U.S., not indoctrinating kids about LGBTQ+ in Uganda,” he averred.
Tuberville did not join the 19 other Republican senators who voted for the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law back during Biden’s presidency. He did not sign the letter written by Republican senators earlier this month asking the Trump administration to unfreeze federal funds designated for public schools, including $68 million meant for Alabama. And he’s called beneficiaries of public programs “inner city rats.”
But evidently federal funding should really go to all of those programs Tuberville has consistently opposed, rather than “indoctrinating kids about LGBTQ+ in Uganda.”
Two years ago, Uganda made having sexual relations with a member of the same sex a crime punishable by life in prison. In cases of “aggravated homosexuality,” the death penalty is a real possibility.
Personally, I fully and earnestly believe international bodies should push back against laws that make loving the wrong person a capital offense. But UNICEF isn’t even doing that as far as I can tell.
Despite repeated Republican intimations to the contrary, like most major government programs UNICEF is essentially an open book. The organization maintains a public “transparency portal” which anyone with some spare time can dig through. It takes a mere matter of minutes to get a basic idea of where UNICEF’s money comes from, where it goes, and how UNICEF actually decides how much to send to any given country.
Looking at UNICEF Uganda’s page on the portal, you’d quickly see that the largest expenses—by far—are on childhood nutrition programs and investments in water and hygiene systems. And the “social and behavior change” programs seem to be primarily focused on combating teen pregnancy and child marriage.
But UNICEF’s most important (and most expensive) work isn’t in Uganda. It’s in countries like Sudan and Yemen, where millions of people are food insecure: the UN recently announced that 638,000 people in Sudan are “facing catastrophic hunger.”
According to a June report, UNICEF helped screen 1.3 million Sudanese children for acute malnutrition in May alone. Just in that month, UNICEF identified over ten thousand children with severe acute malnutrition, referred them to its outpatient therapeutic program, and gave 165,633 pregnant women “iron and folic acid supplementation.”
UNICEF is also responsible for vaccinating millions of children worldwide against life-threatening diseases. The CEO of UNICEF USA wrote in April that “nearly half the world’s children under the age of 5 count on UNICEF and its partners to deliver the vaccines that protect them from disease and even death.” UNICEF USA’s website claims UNICEF has “helped reach more than 760 million children with lifesaving vaccines since 2000, preventing more than 13 million deaths.”
According to that aforementioned transparency portal, the federal government is both the first and third largest donor to UNICEF. And the rescissions package Tuberville helped pass is going to cut the U.S.’ core contributions to UNICEF, totaling $137 million, as well as $5 million in additional funding for the Joint Program on Eliminating Female Genital Mutilation.
UNICEF’s executive director, Catherine Russell, put it plainly in a recent letter to Delaware senator Chris Coons:
“Our core resources are specifically designed to support the children in greatest need and whose lives are most at risk. These resources ensure that UNICEF can be on the ground before, during, and after crises. Indeed, UNICEF is often one of the first humanitarian organizations to respond to a crisis, providing life-saving support to vulnerable families. Simply put, we will not be able to provide needed services next year if our FY25 U.S. contribution is rescinded and too many children will suffer or die as a result.”
What was it that Tuberville said again? Oh, yeah. “No wonder Sen. Ossoff tried to save UNICEF – they are just as woke as he is.”
“Too many children will suffer or die as a result.”
“[UNICEF] are just as woke as he is.”
Please let those two phrases sit in your brain for a minute or two today. Think about what it means that nowadays members of Congress are evidently unashamed to say they voted against funding a program responsible for saving tens of millions of children’s lives on the grounds that it is too “woke.”
Think about the fact that voters are unlikely to punish politicians for these deadly cuts, or for the many, many people abroad who have died or will die because of the Trump admin’s deliberate mismanagement of foreign aid programs. And think about the 500 tons of emergency food that will become 500 tons of ash rather than go to help the victims of famine.
Back in 1965, UNICEF was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, the year immediately after the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. received that same award. I will leave you with an excerpt from the acceptance speech UNICEF’s executive director, Henry Labouisse, delivered that year:
“But to me, the great, the most important meaning of this Nobel award is the solemn recognition that the welfare of today’s children is inseparably linked with the peace of tomorrow’s world. The sufferings and privations to which I have referred do not ennoble; they frustrate and embitter. The longer the world tolerates the slow war of attrition which poverty and ignorance now wage against 800 million children in the developing countries, the more likely it becomes that our hope for lasting peace will be the ultimate casualty.
It is not just in those countries, of course, but in all countries, rich and poor alike, that we adults should constantly ask ourselves: is our society doing, or failing to do, all that is possible to equip our children with the weapons for peace? When our children grow up, will they have trained and informed minds, liberated from the old prejudices and hatreds? Will they trust their own civilization? Will they be prepared to trust and understand others? This is an area way beyond the mandate of our agency – but not beyond the probing of our own conscience, as individuals.”
Here are a few articles that I’ve written for the Alabama Political Reporter recently:
A summary of exhibits in the lawsuit over Alabama’s anti-DEI law
An interview with the likely Democratic nominee for a seat on Alabama’s Supreme Court
Another account of how the state may adjust to forthcoming federal cuts to SNAP
And a write-up of Tuberville and Britt’s vote for the rescissions package
And, for good measure, I’ll also point out a piece or two from other places and other pens you might enjoy:
Robin Wigglesworth’s interview of Steve Berkley for FT Alphaville
Christopher Robbins on the Eric Adams “coordinated criminal conspiracy” lawsuit for Hell Gate
And Jamelle Bouie’s interview of Charles Sumner biographer Zaakir Tameez for the New York Times