Trump Repeats Lie That U.S. Spent $50 Million on Condoms for Gaza: Report

At her first official briefing of Trump’s second term, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt falsely claimed that the administration had blocked $50 million in foreign aid that was earmarked for purchasing condoms to send to Gaza. However, no such expenditure was ever in process, as confirmed by USAID records, which show that none of the agency’s $60.8 million in contraceptive and condom shipments from the previous year went to Gaza or anywhere in the Middle East. Instead, the vast majority of these supplies are directed toward health programs in Africa, reported RollingStone.com.

Leavitt’s claim was made while justifying the administration’s federal funding freeze, which has sparked backlash and widespread confusion. She credited the supposed discovery of the condom expenditure to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and Elon Musk’s newly created Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). Musk himself amplified the statement on social media, calling it the “tip of the iceberg,” and the claim quickly spread through right-wing media outlets, including Fox News host Jesse Watters.

In reality, reports of Hamas using condoms to float makeshift incendiary devices into Israel—cited by Watters and others to justify outrage—date back to 2018 and are unrelated to the current Israel-Gaza conflict. The administration later attempted to walk back Leavitt’s statement, with an official explaining to The Independent that she had conflated two separate $50 million aid packages for medical services in Gaza. These combined grants included funding for various healthcare supplies, but contraception was only a small part of the broader initiatives.

Aid organizations familiar with these programs expressed confusion over the claim. Steve Fake, a representative of American Near East Refugee Aid, which works with USAID on the $50 million Gaza Health Recovery Activity (GHRA), confirmed that their initiative does not include family planning services or the purchase of condoms. “Definitely no purchase of condoms in our program,” Fake said, adding that no one within the aid community could determine where Leavitt’s claim had originated.

Despite the White House’s quiet attempts to downplay the misinformation, Trump continued to push the falsehood. At a press conference before signing the Laken Riley Act into law, he again insisted, “We identified and stopped $50 million being sent to Gaza to buy condoms for Hamas.” He went even further, falsely claiming that the condoms were being used as a method for making bombs.

Leavitt’s misleading statement and Trump’s continued repetition of the claim reflect a familiar pattern from his previous administration, where political rhetoric often took precedence over factual accuracy. Much like Sean Spicer’s infamous lies about the 2017 inauguration crowd size, Leavitt’s first major press briefing suggests that under Trump’s second term, delivering a memorable political talking point remains more important than telling the truth.4o