Officials say USAGM CEO Michael Pack and others pushed to subsidize software built by Falun Gong adherents, diverting OTF money from other tech for dissidents
David Folkenflik / NPR : Tweets: @opentechfund , @skestenbaum , @normornstein , and @davidfolkenflik Tweets: @opentechfund : “Of all the disruptions unleashed by the Trump White House on how the federal government typically works, the saga of one small project, called the Open Technology Fund, stands out.” “The whole fight was, in short, bananas.” The story of where OTF has been Get some popcorn folks https://twitter.com/... Sam Kestenbaum / @skestenbaum : “The fantastical tale incorporates the spiritual movement Falun Gong, former White House strategist Steve Bannon, the daughter of a late liberal congressman and a zealous appointee of former President Donald Trump.” https://www.npr.org/... Norman Ornstein / @normornstein : A brilliant and disturbing report from @davidfolkenflik on the apparent criminal investigation into Michael Pack and his cronies, only one part of the disaster Pack wrought. https://www.npr.org/... David Folkenflik / @davidfolkenflik : The Trump Administration and a liberal activist battled to win millions in federal funds for anti-censorship software called “Ultrasurf” developed by Falun Gong adherents. Now that saga is at the center of a criminal investigation. My exclusive, for NPR https://www.npr.org/...
Context & Ripple Effects
The Open Technology Fund has been under siege since mid-2020, when the abrupt firing of its entire leadership team hit the small agency that funded Signal (abruptly ousted its leadership). By August, the fund had halted 49 of 60 internet-freedom projects after the administration withheld $20M Congress approved, and it sued USAGM to recover the money.
NPR's new reporting adds a motive layer: officials say CEO Michael Pack and associates steered OTF money toward Ultrasurf, an anti-censorship tool built by Falun Gong adherents, away from competing dissident tech — and that the spending is now under criminal investigation. Documents from December showed Pack seeking to cut the fund's budget outright; the subsidy story explains what he wanted the money doing instead.
First-order effects
- Pack and his associates face a reported criminal investigation over OTF spending decisions, converting a governance dispute into potential legal exposure for the USAGM chief.
- Ultrasurf gains subsidized backing at the direct expense of rival anti-censorship tools, reshuffling which dissident technologies get funded while the withheld $20M remains frozen.
Second-order effects
- OTF's lawsuit against USAGM becomes the legal vehicle for resolving both the frozen funds and the disputed allocations, putting Congress's appropriation authority against a Trump-appointed CEO's discretion.
- Grantees in the internet-freedom ecosystem face a funding market where allocation can hinge on political alignment rather than technical merit, raising due-diligence costs for every applicant.
Third-order effects
- If politically directed subsidies become the norm at USAGM, the independent-grant model behind Signal-era innovation gives way to appointee-controlled picking of winners, and congressional earmarks plus litigation become the only counterweight — a template other small federal agencies could inherit.
The trend: US government internet-freedom funding is shifting from insulated technical grantmaking to a political battleground between White House appointees and Congress, with courts deciding who controls the purse.