Four individuals have just pleaded guilty to their involvement in a bribery scheme at the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). 

This, according to Fox News, is the same agency that was targeted - and gutted - by the Trump administration and the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) for its corruption.

The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) announced the guilty pleas last week.

U.S. Agency for International Development Official and Three Corporate Executives Plead Guilty to Bribery Scheme Involving More Than $550 Million in Contracts https://t.co/lFD8AJkY7D@DOJCrimDiv @IRS_CI @USAO_MD

— FBI Washington Field (@FBIWFO) June 13, 2025

The details:

The DOJ has published a press release on the matter in which it details the bribery scheme.

Per the release:

Four men, including a government contracting officer for the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and three owners and presidents of companies, have pleaded guilty for their roles in a decade-long bribery scheme involving at least 14 prime contracts worth over $550 million in U.S. taxpayer dollars.

The four men have been identified as Roderick Watson, a USAID contracting officer; Walter Barnes, the owner and president of PM Consulting Group LLC; Darryl Britt, the owner and president of Apprio, Inc.; and Paul Young, the president of a subcontractor to Vistant and Apprio.

The scheme is complex, but here's a little taste:

According to court documents, beginning in 2013, Watson, while a USAID contracting officer, agreed with Britt to receive bribes in exchange for using Watson’s influence to award contracts to Apprio. As a certified small business under the SBA 8(a) contracting program, which helps socially and economically disadvantaged businesses, Apprio could access lucrative federal contracting opportunities through set-asides and sole-source contracts exclusively available to eligible contractors without a competitive bid process.

See the DOJ's press release for the rest of the details.

"Tip of the iceberg"

Elon Musk used to be President Donald Trump's top DOGE advisor, before he went back to his private work with Tesla, X, and SpaceX.

Accordingly, he got to see firsthand what is going on at USAID, and, apparently, it's bad.

Musk responded to the guilty plea, mentioned above, on social media, suggesting that there is a lot more to come.

"This is just the tip of the iceberg," he wrote in response to reporting about the four guilty pleas.

This will certainly be something to keep an eye on as the Trump administration continues to target waste, fraud, and abuse within the federal government.