New Rule: Department of State to brand all foreign aid with the American flag

The Department of State today launched a rebranding initiative for U.S. aid to other countries; from now on, all logos of Department of State offices and programs responsible for overseas initiatives will be replaced by a single image: the U.S. flag.

"No more rainbow of unidentifiable logos on life-saving aid. There will now be one recognizable symbol: the American flag," Secretary Marco Rubio said. 

This rebranding seeks to make U.S. efforts in other countries easily and clearly recognizable. "The redesign is very simple, and that was to recenter and re-anchor the visual identity of American efforts overseas in the American flag," Darren Beattie, acting undersecretary for Public Diplomacy, said. 

These new directions and rebranding come a day after the secretary of state announced that the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) would officially stop providing foreign assistance, and it will now be the Department of State in charge of distribution to ensure that programs "conform to government policies."

The Department of State, under the leadership of Marco Rubio, is undergoing a process of profound change. The secretary has stated that only foreign assistance programs that align with administration policies and advance U.S. interests will proceed, and these programs will now be administered by the Department of State to achieve greater strategy and efficiency.

Secretary Rubio has also said that USAID used its programs as a "charity," rather than as instruments of U.S. foreign policy to promote national interests. The Department of State, following an assessment of resources sent overseas, said that often those programs promoted anti-American ideas and groups such as the concept of global "DEI" (diversity, equity and inclusion), censorship, regime change operations, and also NGOs and international organizations that have ties to U.S. geopolitical adversaries. 

"That ends today," Rubio said, referring to waste. Regarding the new directive that all aid be under the American flag logo, he added, "Recipients deserve to know the assistance provided to them is not a handout from an unknown NGO, but an investment from the American people."

The secretary of state's vision is a profound shift in the way the Department of State operates. Now, under the Trump administration, the U.S. will no longer provide unlimited and unconditional aid, and all foreign-funded initiatives must be tied to the country's interests.