FACT CHECK: USAID Didn’t Pay Time Magazine To Name Zelenskyy Time Person Of The Year

A post shared on Facebook claims the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) paid Time Magazine to name President Volodymyr Zelenskyy as Time Person of the Year.

Verdict: False

There is no evidence for this claim.

Fact Check:

Social media users are claiming that USAID paid Time Magazine $4 million to name Zelenskyy Time Person of the Year. One user wrote, “It turns out that USAID paid Time magazine $4 million to make Zelensky ‘Person of the Year.’”

This claim is false. Check Your Fact could not find any reporting that USAID had paid $4 million to Time. There is no reporting on the New York Post’s website about this claim. (RELATED: No, Gene Hackman Did Not Post About The Epstein List Before His Death)

Neither is there any evidence for this claim from USAID’s spending. Check Your Fact reviewed  USASpending.gov and did not find any money from USAID to Time for naming Zelenskyy Person of the Year. Zelenskyy was Time’s 2022 Person of the Year.

Lead Stories also debunked this claim. Lead Stories reported that “[o]n February 27, 2025, the Ukrainian government Center for Countering Disinformation wrote on Telegram (archived here) about the claim reviewed in this fact check, as translated by DeepL: This information is untrue.”