John — Mark Kelly here.

About 40 years ago, I was on a ship carrying food assistance to Egypt. It was a goodwill mission, part of our foreign policy in the 1980s.

It’s a mission that’s very familiar to the thousands and thousands of Americans who have served with USAID since it was established in the 1960s. There are millions of people around the world who were fed, clothed, given medical care, educated, or otherwise supported by USAID in the 60 years since.

Foreign aid — much of which passes through USAID — is less than 1% of our budget. For that investment we do an enormous amount of good in the world, and we keep our own nation safe by preventing pandemics and conflict.

By now, most of you have heard that Elon Musk and the Trump administration are dismantling USAID. It’s a bad move, and I want to be clear about this: They’ll be held accountable, one way or another.

But the bigger question of why this is happening — why foreign assistance, why USAID, with all of the good it accomplishes — is essential to consider. They’re slashing essential government programs as quickly as they can to lay the groundwork for a massive, trillion-dollar tax cut for billionaires and corporations.

The White House and Elon Musk are flooding the zone with outrageous, illegal, and unconstitutional actions to try and keep us off balance. But we’re fighting back in the Senate with every tool available to us, and lawsuits challenging these actions are rising through the courts at a rapid pace.

They want us off balance, but I am holding my ground. They want you to feel powerless, but you are not. They want us to think they have full control, but the rule of law still exists.

I am not going to back down, but it’s going to take all of us doing what we can to push back.

So, please. If you can, chip in $3 or anything you can afford to support my work. It’d mean a lot to have you with me.

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Hold fast, we’ll get through this.

Thank you,

Mark

Paid For By Mark Kelly for Senate

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Mark Kelly was a Captain in the U.S. Navy and astronaut. Use of his military rank, job titles and photographs in uniform does not imply endorsement by the Department of the Navy or Department of Defense and reference to NASA does not imply endorsement by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.