TRUMP'S WORLD WIDE WAR ON KIDS WITH BRUCE LESLEY AND NICHOLAS KRISTOF
Ah, our children—the pint-sized humans who keep us awake at night, wipe their sticky hands on our clean clothes, and occasionally remind us why we endure it all with their innocent giggles. They’re the future, right? Wrong. Apparently, they’re now the enemy. At least, that’s how it feels if you’ve been keeping up with the ongoing saga of policies that seem to have declared an outright war on kids. And no, this isn’t the plot of a dystopian Netflix series. This is real life.
Let’s start here at home, where Bruce Lesley, President of First Focus on Children and co-host of the 'Speaking of Kids' podcast, has been sounding the alarm on what he calls "The Unprecedented War on Children" on his ‘Kids Can't Wait’ SUBSTACK “. It’s a title that would make even George Orwell do a double take. Lesley outlines 21 coordinated attacks on children’s health, education, development, safety, and fundamental rights. Yes, 21! That’s more attacks than Taylor Swift has ex-boyfriends.
These aren’t your run-of-the-mill policy tweaks either. We’re talking about proposals to abolish the Department of Education (because who needs learning?), gut Medicaid and SNAP (because food and healthcare are apparently overrated), and defund child-serving nonprofits (because why bother feeding or sheltering kids when we can just let them fend for themselves like feral cats?). Project 2025 even suggests cutting programs like PBS and NPR because, clearly, Big Bird is a threat to national security.
But wait, there’s more! H.R. 1 shifts resources away from children to wealthier and older populations. It’s like Robin Hood in reverse—stealing from the young and poor to give to the rich and retired. Add in mental health service cuts during a youth mental health crisis, defunding vaccination programs amidst rising vaccine hesitancy, and environmental deregulation that exposes kids to pollution and toxins, and you’ve got yourself a full-blown war zone.
And let’s not forget the cultural battlegrounds: book bans in schools, politicized curricula, and executive orders banning gender-affirming care for LGBTQ youth. It’s like someone decided that “ignorance is bliss” should be our national motto.
But hey, America isn’t hogging all the bad decisions. No siree! Globally, we’re dropping the ball too. Enter Nicholas Kristof, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and professional guilt tripper (in the best way possible). Kristof recently returned from West Africa with stories that could make even the Grinch cry.
In his New York Times piece “The One Global Problem That’s Easy to Fix,” Kristof highlights starvation as a solvable issue. And in a interview on 'The Last Word With Lawrence O’Donnell' Yes, solvable! Unlike climate change or Middle East peace talks, hunger is one of those rare global problems where we actually know what to do. Deworming pills? Check. Peanut paste (RUTF)? Check. Exclusive breastfeeding promotion? Check. And yet here we are, with warehouses in Rhode Island and Atlanta stuffed with life-saving peanut paste that isn’t reaching the starving children who need it.
Why? Well, because cutting humanitarian aid is apparently en vogue these days. Kristof points out that programs like PEPFAR, which has saved 25 million lives by combating HIV/AIDS in Africa, are now on the chopping block thanks to decisions by leaders who will never see the consequences of their actions firsthand. Imagine being so out of touch that you think starving children are just a line item in a budget spreadsheet.
Kristof doesn’t mince words when describing what he’s seen: kids too malnourished to cry or protest, their bodies covered in sores that won’t heal. These aren’t just statistics; they’re human beings—tiny ones who didn’t ask to be caught up in this mess.
And yet, here we are debating whether we can afford to save them while simultaneously finding billions for tax cuts for the wealthy. It’s like saying you can’t afford groceries because you just bought a yacht. Priorities, people!
The irony is that solving starvation isn’t just about humanitarianism; it’s about self-interest too. Diseases like Ebola and tuberculosis don’t need passports to cross borders. Global surveillance systems supported by USAID help stop these diseases before they become pandemics. But hey, who needs public health when you’ve got aircraft carriers?
Kristof also reminds us of past successes—like how we nearly eliminated mother-to-child HIV transmission through programs that provided test kits and ARVs to pregnant women. Now those programs are being defunded, and we’re seeing a resurgence of preventable tragedies. It’s like building a sandcastle only to kick it over yourself.
So what’s driving these disastrous policies? Lesley suggests it’s an ideology that devalues children as individuals with rights and dignity. Kristof adds that it’s also about ignorance—leaders who don’t understand or care about the human cost of their decisions.
But here’s the thing: It doesn’t have to be this way. We have the resources, knowledge, and solutions to turn things around. What we lack is the political will.
So let’s channel our inner Leslie Knope (because who doesn’t love 'Parks and Recreation'?) and fight for these kids. Write to your representatives. Donate to organizations doing the work on the ground. Share stories like Bruce Lesley's and Nick Kristof’s so more people understand what’s at stake.
Because at the end of the day, this isn’t just about saving kids—it’s about saving ourselves from becoming a society so indifferent that we let our most vulnerable suffer while we argue about whether Big Bird is too liberal.
And honestly, if we can’t rally behind peanut paste and deworming pills, what hope do we have?
The Last Word With Lawrence O’Donnell - June 18 | Audio Only https://youtu.be/ztBqPB6mho8?si=Gw9GidRG5haMYm-N via @YouTube
[37:53](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ztBqPB6mho8&t=2273.6400146484375) The video discusses the emotional toll of reporting on child malnutrition and the urgency of addressing this crisis, emphasizing the availability of life-saving resources that remain unused while children suffer.
- The emotional detachment of those witnessing suffering is noted, as the body prioritizes survival over emotional responses.}
- The reporter expresses disbelief at the indifference of influential figures towards the plight of starving children.}
- A specific life-saving product, RUTF, is highlighted as being available yet unused, underscoring the absurdity of child deaths due to malnutrition.}
- The video stresses that severe malnutrition accounts for a significant percentage of child deaths globally, and emphasizes the low cost of interventions.}
- The discussion concludes with a call to action against the waste of resources and the urgent need to prevent unnecessary child deaths.}
TRANSCRIPT:
Here’s a rewritten version for improved grammar and clarity:
What Elon Musk and Donald Trump Have Wrought
We’ll be right back with Nick Kristof. Has anyone in the world died because of what Elon Musk did? Yes or no? Reclaiming my time—if you won’t answer, that’s a loud answer. The people who have died as a result of cutting off the oxygen for a woman in Burma and denying HIV/AIDS treatment to those in Africa are dead now at the hands of Elon Musk and his co-conspirators. That was Donald Trump’s Secretary of State trying to mislead the world about the people, including children and babies, who are dying of starvation because Donald Trump, Elon Musk, and Marco Rubio have decided they should die instead of survive with the food and nourishment the United States has consistently provided to starving people around the world, regardless of who was in power.
Tonight, thanks to Marco Rubio, Elon Musk, and Donald Trump, 185,535 boxes of life-saving nutrition are stuck in a warehouse of a Rhode Island company that produces a life-saving peanut paste protein, which has made the difference between life and death for children in famine conditions in Africa and elsewhere around the globe. Nicholas Kristof wrote about this during his last trip to see the starving children that Donald Trump and Marco Rubio have never seen and likely never will.
In my journalistic career, I’ve witnessed children dying from bullets, malaria, cholera, and simple diarrhea, but perhaps the hardest to watch are those who are starving. Their bodies develop sores that don’t heal, their hair falls out, and their skin peels. By that point, even nourishing food doesn’t always bring them back. What is most eerie is that such children don’t cry or protest; they are impassive with blank faces. This is because their bodies are fighting to keep their organs functioning and refuse to waste energy on tears or protests.
Nick Kristof is back with us. Thank you so much for your reporting on this situation, and for finding the words that truly describe what it is like to see kids like this. For those who haven’t seen them, it is inconceivable. I don’t think if Donald Trump, Elon Musk, or Marco Rubio had ever seen them, they could continue with their actions. I’ve built up emotional armor when I go out and do this kind of reporting, but what breaks through that armor is seeing a child dying—especially when it’s unnecessary, as in the case of a child dying of starvation for want of a $1 packet of this peanut paste called RUTF.
This product is sitting in a warehouse in Rhode Island, with more in a warehouse outside Atlanta. There’s a picture of a child right there beside it. This product is not something that American schoolchildren need or have used; it is recognized for how much it brings kids back from the brink. It is a life-saving substance, and the U.S. pioneered this effort. The U.S. has been a leader in fighting malnutrition. Forty-five percent of child deaths worldwide are attributable to severe malnutrition, and yet it is so cheap to save these lives. We not only turn away but insult these kids by claiming that nobody is dying.
I wish Rubio could accompany me on a trip like the one I just took to these villages and clinics to see these kids dying for want of this peanut paste or for antiretrovirals if they have HIV, which costs less than 12 cents a day. We are cutting off some of these programs, and as a result, kids are dying. They talk about waste and abuse in USAID, but there is waste and abuse when this paste is sitting in warehouses, and there is waste and abuse when these kids are dying unnecessarily.
You make the point that starvation is one of the easiest problems in the world for us to solve. We actually have the solution and know how to do it. That’s right. There are many problems that are hard to tackle, but this is one we can actually solve. Simple solutions include deworming pills, which cost almost nothing, and this RUTF peanut paste, along with the promotion of exclusive breastfeeding for six months and providing antiretrovirals for AIDS. We know how to do this, and we’ve saved many lives.
I’d also like to point out that many people think, “This isn’t our job.” However, what’s at stake is not only our values but also our interests. We may be threatened by Erdoğan’s nuclear program, but we are also threatened by Ebola in Liberia, which may pose a greater risk, along with tuberculosis generated in these countries. Aircraft carriers don’t protect us from these diseases; what does is a global surveillance system supported by USAID and efforts to stop these diseases in their tracks. This is where humanitarianism and national interest converge, and we’ve dropped the ball.
We’re at a solution stage. For example, back in the 1980s, we didn’t know how to combat HIV, but now we do. Dr. Fauci and George W. Bush instituted a program in Africa that is a solution to the spread of AIDS, saving 25 million lives. Yet Donald Trump, Elon Musk, and Marco Rubio have said, “That’s it, no more of that.” One of the great triumphs of that program, PEPFAR, was that we stopped mother-to-child transmission.
During my recent trip, I saw that because they are running out of HIV test kits, which the U.S. had provided, they can’t test pregnant mothers. They don’t know who has HIV, and as a result, we are beginning to see more mother-to-child transmission. To witness this happening on our watch, after we had largely stopped this problem, is heartbreaking. We knew how to address it, but because of decisions made by individuals in Washington who are oblivious to the consequences of their actions—who will never see the human toll of their decisions—it is devastating to see these babies suffer.
Thank you so much, Nick Kristof, for your reporting and for bringing this to us. This information is invaluable, and we really need to hear it. Thank you very much for joining us tonight.
Thank you, Lawrence. We’ll be right back. New York Times Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist Nick Kristof, just back from Africa, gets tonight’s last word.
If you need any further adjustments or specific changes, feel free to ask!
