Abstract. The article explores the basics of the U.S. foreign humanitarian aid policy and the problems, trends and priorities of aid allocation. The author also uses the U.S. case to raise the problem of influence of donor's political interests on the distribution of humanitarian aid in anthropogenic disasters, which in theory should be an impartial response to acute humanitarian crisis in the recipient country. The main conclusion is that distribution of the U.S. humanitarian aid does not follow a uniform pattern, but is generally affected by the state of bilateral relations between the United States and the recipient country.