The Hagstrom Report
Hyde-Smith: MSU Fish Innovation Lab to be protected
The Hagstrom Report
Friday, June 27, 2025 | Volume 15 Number 142
Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith, R-Miss., said Thursday that the Trump administration has agreed to continue funding for the Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Fish at Mississippi State University.
Hyde-Smith said she discussed the MSU program with White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Russell Vought during a Senate Appropriations Committee hearing Wednesday to review President Trump’s request to rescind $9.4 billion in previously-appropriated funding.
The MSU Fish Innovation Lab has been affected by freezes imposed on funding associated with the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), including large portions its Development Assistance account from which the MSU Fish Innovation Lab received $3 million annually, Hyde-Smith noted in a news release.
“I want to bring to your attention an example of how Development Assistance funds are being put to good use,” Hyde-Smith told Vought.
“The lab’s work illustrates the proverb, ‘Give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish, and you feed him for a lifetime.’ This is exactly what the MSU Fish Innovation Lab is doing. Rather than giving other countries food, we are teaching them how to feed themselves through modern aquaculture practices.”
Hyde-Smith asked Vought whether the Fish Innovation Lab’s work to promote global food security, improve livelihoods, and strengthen the resiliency of aquatic food production in developing nations qualifies as an appropriate priority under the goals of the White House spending cuts package.
Vought testified that there is still foreign assistance funding available to fund priority programs like the MSU program.
“We will still have $5 billion nearly in this funding for priorities and programs like this, which will be protected. So, we have no desire in this rescissions package to touch that funding that seems as to be so successful,” Vought said.
During the hearing, Vought defended the overall rescissions package that primarily takes aim at foreign aid programs, with more than $8.3 billion targeted while retaining funds for “life-saving” programs.
“The proposal would also rescind $8.3 billion in funding for the State Department, USAID, and other foreign aid that has been used to advance left-wing causes abroad to the detriment of recipient nations and our own. It is critical that this body—and the American people writ large—understand that many foreign aid programs use benevolent-sounding titles to hide truly appalling activity that is not in line with American interests,” Vought testified.
Trump submitted his rescissions request to Congress on June 3 under the Impoundment Control Act of 1974, which triggered a 45-day period for both the House and Senate to agree to cancel the funds. The House of Representatives voted 214-212 on June 12 to approve the package.
Mississippi State University — Feed the Future Innovation Labor for Fish