Trump Officials Ordered by Judge to Lift Freeze on USAID Funding

A federal judge temporarily blocked President Donald Trump’s executive order cutting financing for foreign assistance programs administered by the US Agency for International Development.

US District Judge Amir Ali in Washington said in a written ruling late Thursday he was convinced that unless he halted the administration’s actions, “the scale of the enormous harm that has already occurred will almost certainly increase.”

The order comes after USAID has seen thousands of staff fired or put on leave and even its name stripped off its Washington headquarters. Trump’s Jan. 30 executive order immediately stopped all congressionally appropriated foreign assistance funding for the agency pending review. The president said he planned to cancel support for groups his administration deems are not working in the interests of the US.

A report this week from the beleaguered agency’s inspector general’s office estimated that nearly $500 million of emergency food assistance paid for by US taxpayers is at risk of being ruined by the Trump administration’s freeze of all US foreign aid, including what’s doled out by USAID. The White House fired the agency’s inspector general after the report came out.

Read More: Waste, Lawsuits and Jobs Add to Costs of Chaotic USAID Shutdown

Two separate lawsuits prompted Thursday’s ruling. One was brought by the AIDS Vaccine Advocacy Coalition and Journalism Development Network, both of which receiving financing from USAID. The other was filed by a coalition of lawyers’ associations, global health and international business groups.

The organizations alleged that the president’s executive order was arbitrary and forced them to lay off staff, slash budgets and compromise their missions. The complaints cited both constitutional and administrative violations.

While the judge found that the groups made a “strong” showing of harm, he declined their request to halt the administration’s review of USAID programs. Ali also refused to stop the administration from modifying or terminating contracts as allowed by the terms of the agreements.

In a related case, US District Judge Carl J. Nichols on Thursday extended by a week a pause on Trump’s directive placing more than 2,000 USAID employees on administrative leave and forcing the return of overseas workers, according to the New York Times.

Dozens of lawsuits have been filed challenging the slew of executive orders issued by Trump last month. Courts have dealt the administration several setbacks. Those include rulings blocking the president’s move to end so-called birthright citizenship for babies of undocumented immigrants, as well as his effort to freeze federal spending and allow billionaire Elon Musk’s government efficiency team access to Treasury Department payments data.

The cases are AIDS Vaccine Advocacy Coalition v. US Department of State, 25-cv-400, and Global Health Council v. Trump, 25-cv-00402, US District Court, District of Columbia (Washington).

--With assistance from Zoe Tillman.

To contact the reporter on this story:
Robert Burnson in San Francisco at rburnson@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story:
Sara Forden at sforden@bloomberg.net

Peter Blumberg

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