ICYMI: America’s Atheist Diplomacy

Washington, D.C. - Today, House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Michael McCaul published an op-ed in "First Things" magazine criticizing the Biden-Harris administration for using taxpayer dollars to promote atheism programs abroad. Over the past few years, Chairman McCaul has conducted an investigation into the misallocation of funds by the State Department and found the Office of International Religious Freedom failed to protect religious freedom and violated the U.S. Constitution.

America's Atheist Diplomacy
By Chairman Michael McCaul
"First Things"
November 13, 2024

For the last two years, a little-watched congressional investigation has been exploring the nature of religious freedom and, specifically, whether the United States is an effective steward of that cause when it funds ideologically charged foreign aid projects overseas. After obtaining information the Department of State tried to keep hidden, my colleagues and I have learned that some members of our nation's diplomatic corps consider the concept of "religious freedom" to be as malleable as clay, even entailing, in some cases, government promotion of nonbelief. Regardless of one's faith tradition or political allegiances, this distortion is cause for concern.

[…]

This matter came to our attention in 2021 with a "notice of funding opportunity" for $500,000. Issued by the State Department's Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor, the notice solicited proposals for programs that would "promote and defend religious freedom inclusive of atheist, humanist, non-practicing and non-affiliated individuals." In particular, the Department indicated to NGOs that the proposed programs should "increase capacity" of atheists and humanists to "form" and "strengthen" their "networks" in South Asia. If you cut through the diplospeak, that translates to: We want you all to come up with ideas for expanding the presence and influence of atheists overseas. The State Department, through the deployment of U.S. taxpayer dollars, sought to evangelize on behalf of the nonreligious-which is illegal under the Establishment Clause of the United States Constitution.

[…]

The use of U.S. taxpayer money for programs that reject U.S. law and proselytize on behalf of atheists is bad enough. But the story gets worse: The NGO chosen to implement the grant was Humanists International, a group whose CEO has stated that the Catholic Church is "an institution which I think that you should be ashamed to be involved in" and has said that his job is "to combat the Vatican policies and to push against them." Thus, the State Department has seen fit to provide "religious freedom" funding to an organization that seeks to "combat" certain religious faiths.

[…]

Finally, the Department conceded that, very late in the game, it had "become aware" of problematic slides that were presented to program participants in Asia-but insisted that the Department itself was not at fault. Rather, Humanists International had not been truthful with program officers.

[…]

The point is not to pick on humanists. They should be allowed to live and advocate as their ­ consciences dictate. Nor is it to denigrate altogether the work done by the State Department's Office of International Religious Freedom, some of which is quite good. The point is that Congress has a duty to share the information to which it has privileged access. In this case, we observe an elite, professional class that has no qualms about using taxpayer ­ money to export its own secular agenda overseas, attempting to keep the details from being known outside the Department.

[…]

To call the promotion of atheism in Nepal a luxury, however, is too generous. It is sheer folly.

Read the full op-ed here.

###