US State Department directs millions to European right-wing think tanks

In February 2025 Donald Trump declared USAID corrupt at levels rarely seen before and ordered its effective closure within hours. The move was sold as America first: an end to taxpayer money flowing abroad for what the administration called ridiculous projects. Six months later the same State Department that shuttered USAID is preparing to send $12 million to conservative organisations in the United Kingdom, $7 million of it to a think tank incorporated only in March and co-founded by Jacob Rees-Mogg, a former minister whose personal wealth is estimated above £100 million.

The funding pipeline from Washington to Westminster

The Guardian reported in July that the State Department intends to award the grants without the competitive process normally required for foreign assistance. A former US official told the paper that standard procedures are being subverted so money can reach Trump-aligned causes. The recipient 878 describes itself as a leading British and American think tank dedicated to strengthening the civilisational partnership between the United Kingdom and the United States. Its website offers little detail on concrete activities. Critics say the vagueness is deliberate. Zsuzsanna Végh, a researcher in liberal democracy, told the i Paper that the advertising of the funding calls follows a long period of networking among Maga and like-minded European actors, which have already facilitated the identification of a pool of possible recipients.

The US embassy in London is simultaneously offering grants of up to $500,000 for public education programmes that foster a national conversation about shared civilizational values. One recently departed State Department official characterised this as an attempt to create UK-originated narratives to support Maga propaganda. Lisa Smart, a Liberal Democrat MP, put it more bluntly: she accused Trump's Maga money of meddling in our democracy. The language mirrors accusations the Trump movement has levelled at foreign interference in US elections for years.

A new think tank with old money

Rees-Mogg's involvement draws attention because of the contrast between his personal fortune and the populist rhetoric of the movement he now serves. The £100 million net worth estimate comes from Register of Members' Financial Interests declarations and Sunday Times Rich List data. 878 was incorporated in March 2025, weeks before the State Department signalled its funding intent. No public record shows the organisation has produced research, hosted events or hired staff beyond its founders. The $7 million allocation would exceed the annual budget of many established British policy institutes. A former US official described the arrangement as a bureaucratic form of meddling: the grants appear designed to build infrastructure for a transnational right rather than to support existing civil society.

The State Department has not published the full list of intended recipients. The Guardian's reporting suggests other UK groups are in line for the remaining $5 million. In Europe the same funding calls invite proposals to develop civilizational self-confidence in Europe and address national sovereignty, migration, censorship, and lawfare challenges in line with our shared political philosophy, law, and Western heritage. The phrase civilizational self-confidence appears in the Trump administration's December 2025 national security strategy, which claimed Europe faced civilizational erasure and pledged US policies must include cultivating resistance to Europe's current trajectory within European nations.

The language of civilisational warfare

That strategy document is the clearest statement yet of an ideological project that treats European democracies as terrain to be contested rather than allies to be supported. It frames progressive policies on migration, gender and speech as existential threats to Western heritage. The grants operationalise that worldview. By funding organisations that adopt the same vocabulary, Washington creates a dependent network of validators. The approach recalls Cold War cultural diplomacy but with a crucial difference: the target is not a communist bloc but the elected governments of NATO allies. Friedrich Merz, the German chancellor, warned the Trump administration against interfering in German elections after the grant announcements. His statement was unusually direct for a leader who has prioritised transatlantic unity since taking office.

Merz's intervention reflects a broader European unease. The European Commission has no formal mechanism to police foreign political funding of this kind, though the Defence of Democracy package proposed in 2024 would require transparency for non-EU funding of political foundations and think tanks. That legislation remains stalled in the Council. In the meantime, the US embassy in London operates its grant programme without notifying British authorities. The Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office has not commented publicly on whether it was consulted.

CPAC goes global

The financial pipeline runs alongside a parallel organising effort. The Conservative Political Action Conference, once a purely domestic US gathering, held its first international conference in Tokyo in 2017. Since then it has convened in Australia, Hungary, Brazil, Hong Kong, Mexico, South Korea and Poland. In Warsaw last year Kristi Noem, then homeland security secretary, broke established diplomatic norms by endorsing Karol Nawrocki, a presidential candidate running on the slogan Poland first, Poles first. Nawrocki narrowly won. Noem's appearance signalled that the US executive branch now views explicit electoral intervention in allied countries as acceptable when the candidate aligns with MAGA.

Last month saw the launch of CPAC GB, spearheaded by Liz Truss, whose premiership lasted 49 days. Matt Schlapp, CPAC's chair, told Axios that the fight for freedom and conservative values doesn't stop at America's borders. The British franchise gives the movement a permanent institutional presence in Westminster. Truss's involvement is notable: she was removed from office by her own party after a mini-budget that crashed the pound, yet she now leads an organisation funded by the same US political network that claims to champion fiscal responsibility.

German pushback and the limits of influence

Merz's warning may mark the outer boundary of what European leaders will tolerate. Germany's history makes it acutely sensitive to foreign political interference, and the chancellor's statement carried weight in Berlin and beyond. But the grants are already flowing. The State Department has not responded to Merz's objection. The White House has not commented on whether the president approves each allocation. The disconnect between the rhetoric of America first and the reality of millions directed to European think tanks is not lost on observers in Brussels. One EU diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity, described it as a Marshall Plan for the hard right without the reconstruction.

The comparison is imperfect but revealing. The original Marshall Plan transferred roughly $150 billion in today's money to rebuild European economies on condition of cooperation and market opening. The current programme transfers a fraction of that sum to ideological allies with no conditionality beyond political alignment. The scale is smaller but the intent is clearer: to shift the Overton window in European capitals by resourcing organisations that treat liberal democracy as the problem rather than the solution.

The domestic political cost

The irony that defines this story is the gap between the administration's domestic promises and its international spending. Trump campaigned on ending foreign wars and fixing American infrastructure. Instead the Iran war has cost at least $37.5 billion so far, according to Pentagon estimates. Pete Hegseth, the defence secretary, spent millions on ribeye steak for the Pentagon in September 2025 while USAID staff sat on indefinite administrative leave. A Politico poll last month found just a third of Trump's MAGA base thought the Iran war was worth the cost, down from half in May. Joe Rogan, whose podcast reaches tens of millions, has turned on the president over the war's expense.

Trump dismissed cost-of-living concerns last year, declaring he did not want to hear about affordability. His personal fortune grew by an estimated $2.2 billion in 2025, largely through the appreciation of Trump Media shares and licensing deals. The average voter who backed him on the promise of an America first agenda is unlikely to know about the $12 million flowing to British think tanks. They are more likely to notice the price of petrol and groceries. The Politico poll suggests that awareness is spreading. When even Rogan breaks ranks, the administration's ability to control the narrative through friendly media fractures.