The US State Department just launched a $5 million grant scheme to fund
organisations in Europe — pushing "Western civilizational heritage,"
anti-migration narratives, and attacks on the free press.

Right before Germany's September 2026 elections.

This is not a conspiracy theory. It is an official US government programme,
published on state.gov, run by a bureau originally created to fight Soviet
authoritarianism. That same bureau is now targeting allied democracies.

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz had to warn Washington publicly : stay out
of our elections.

In this episode of Over Here, Over There, we look at what is actually in
this grant scheme, who is behind it, why Germany is uniquely placed to
recognise the danger — and what it means when the country that spent decades
lecturing the world about election interference starts doing it to its friends.

Key Topics

• US foreign policy funding in Europe
• Germany's response to US influence
• The role of the State Department in European politics
• Historical context of US democracy promotion
• The impact of foreign funding on European elections
• Germany's constitutional resilience against external influence
• The evolution of the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor
• Implications for US-Germany relations

Sound Bites

• "Germany had to warn the US not to interfere with its elections"
• "Developing civilizational bonds, democratic resilience and rule of law in Europe"
• "Germany's constitutional model was built to be hard to break"

🎙️ Over Here, Over There — the transatlantic podcast and beyond, comparing how the same world looks different from Europe and America.

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