It’s been a week of RIFs, rescissions, and Rigas. No, not Riga, Latvia — where incidentally my grandmother was born, and a beautiful capital to visit. I’m talking about Michael Rigas, U.S. deputy secretary of state for management and resources, who testified before lawmakers on Capitol Hill last week about the reorganization of the State Department.
There were — unsurprisingly, in this heated partisan climate — some fireworks, with Rigas struggling to explain why the administration locked away enough food for 1.5 million children until it expired, and must now burn it.
That same day, there was also lots of coffee being downed as senators stayed up all night to debate U.S. President Donald Trump’s $9 billion rescissions package to claw back previously approved funding, most of it foreign assistance.