On June 5, 2026, the USDA confirmed the first U.S. case of the New World Screwworm in years, in a three-week-old calf in La Pryor, Texas, about 50 miles from the Mexico border. The screwworm is a parasitic fly whose larvae burrow into the healthy tissue of warm-blooded livestock and can kill an infected animal within 7 to 10 days if untreated.
The surveillance program built to keep the parasite out, a USAID-funded effort to monitor and prevent its spread across the U.S.-Mexico border, was among roughly 5,300 USAID grants and programs eliminated by Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency in early 2025, about two months before the first confirmed U.S. case. Musk had called USAID a “crazy waste of money” and a “radical-left political psy op.”
The USDA estimates that an outbreak comparable to an isolated 1976 case could cost the Texas economy roughly $1.8 billion. Texas Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller urged President Trump to deploy “every available federal resource” to head off a catastrophe for ranchers. The episode is a documented example of a DOGE cut producing a direct, costly consequence.
On June 10, 2026, Trump blamed the Biden administration for the outbreak. But the USAID-funded surveillance and prevention program he was referring to was running under Biden and was eliminated by Trump's own DOGE in early 2025, roughly two months before the first U.S. case.