Well, isn’t this just classic? Another day, another mainstream media host gets tripped up by their own narrative. This time, it was CBS’s Margaret Brennan who thought she had Rep. Brian Mast (R-FL) cornered—until he pulled out a list of inconvenient facts that shut down her line of questioning faster than a malfunctioning teleprompter at a White House press briefing.
The exchange took place on 60 Minutes, where Brennan, seemingly convinced that Republicans were just making things up about the State Department’s obsession with Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI), pressed Mast to provide proof. And boy, did he ever.
The man came prepared, rattling off examples like a human receipt of taxpayer waste: half a million dollars for expanding atheism in Nepal, $50,000 for a transgender opera in Colombia, $47,000 for an LGBTQ trans comic book in Peru, and $20,000 per event for drag shows in Ecuador. That’s right, while everyday Americans struggle to afford groceries and gas, the State Department has been busy bankrolling ideological pet projects abroad.
Now, here’s where it gets really good. Instead of addressing the substance of Mast’s response, Brennan scrambled to change the subject. Her defense? These were just “small amounts of money” and foreign aid only accounts for “less than 1%” of the federal budget.
Oh, well, in that case, we should just look the other way, right? Because $500,000 here and $50,000 there is no big deal—unless, of course, it’s a tax cut, in which case every penny is an existential crisis.
This is the playbook. When confronted with uncomfortable truths, the left’s go-to move is to minimize, deflect, or shift focus entirely. Never mind that these expenditures are proof that DEI has taken precedence over actual diplomacy. Never mind that foreign aid, regardless of its percentage of the budget, is still funded by hardworking American taxpayers who might have some concerns about subsidizing drag shows in Ecuador while their own communities are struggling. Nope, the real problem, according to the media, is that Republicans dare to ask questions about how their constituents’ money is being spent.
What’s particularly amusing is that Brennan likely assumed Mast wouldn’t have specifics—because the media rarely does. They thrive on narratives, not data. But when confronted with cold, hard facts, they suddenly lose interest in their own line of questioning. It’s a pattern we’ve seen before: demand proof, get proof, then pretend it doesn’t matter. It’s as predictable as another round of inflation after reckless government spending.
Margaret Brennan, who recently got humiliated in her interview with VP Vance, gets humiliated again when she asks for examples of DEI waste in foreign aid the US gives.
Rep. Mast came with the receipts and owned Brennan.pic.twitter.com/7LBWGbKmdT
— Paul A. Szypula 🇺🇸 (@Bubblebathgirl) February 2, 2025
And let’s not forget the broader issue here. The State Department should be focused on protecting American interests, not funding social experiments around the world. If U.S. diplomacy is going to be reduced to a DEI activism fund, then maybe it does need a purge—one that prioritizes national security over ideological vanity projects.
Mast made his point, and Brennan’s attempt to brush it off only reinforced it. Because in the end, the left’s favorite talking point—there’s nothing to see here—only works when people aren’t paying attention. Unfortunately for them, more and more Americans are.
