Personnel handling the State Department agency’s essential duties have been exempted.
The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) issued a notice on Feb. 4 instructing all direct hire personnel to be placed on “administrative leave globally” from Friday, except for those handling essential duties.
The notice, posted on USAID’s website,
stated that there would be exceptions for “designated personnel responsible for mission-critical functions, core leadership and specially designated programs.”
Agency leadership will notify essential personnel expected to continue working by Feb. 6, according to the notice.
It stated that USAID is working with the State Department on a plan to coordinate the return of overseas personnel to the United States within 30 days and to terminate contractors handling non-essential work.
Elon Musk, who leads the Department of Government Efficiency,
said during a live session on the social media platform X on Monday that USAID is “beyond repair” and President Donald Trump had agreed that it should be shuttered.
Since taking office on Jan. 20, Trump has placed a 90-day freeze on all foreign aid and development funding pending reviews to align the agency with his “America First” policy platform.
His administration has also placed many senior USAID officials on administrative leave, including those who refused to comply with his foreign aid order and another order banning diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives in the federal government. There has also been a widespread layoff of contractors.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio has since
confirmed that he has taken over as acting USAID chief, and said that he had delegated the authority to someone with whom he is in touch.
The agency’s website is
offline, and its employees were instructed on Monday to stay out of the agency’s headquarters in Washington. A group of lawmakers from the Democratic Party and agency employees
gathered outside the headquarters later that day to protest the administration’s decision to shut down USAID.
Congressional Democrats have argued that USAID is vital to national security and that ending the agency would harm U.S. foreign policy interests by allowing adversarial nations to fill the gaps in foreign aid.
“The work USAID does is vital to all Americans,” Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.)
said at the rally. “Its elimination only helps our adversaries, Russia and China, who want to see our influence reduced at any cost.”
USAID is an independent agency established by President John F. Kennedy in 1961 through the Foreign Assistance Act. The agency is responsible for administering U.S. foreign aid and development assistance.
According to a Congressional Research Service
report published on Jan. 6, USAID has more than 10,000 employees, with approximately two-thirds serving overseas. About 130 countries—including Ukraine, Afghanistan, Nigeria, Yemen, and Syria—received aid from the agency during the 2023 fiscal year, the report stated.
Rubio
told reporters on Monday that USAID should align with the national interests and foreign policy of the United States. He disputed claims that the agency works as an independent entity and can set its own policy, pointing out on multiple occasions that it uses taxpayer funding.
“So this is not about ending the programs that USAID does per se. There are things that it does that are good and there are things that it does that we have strong questions about,” he said. “It’s about the way it operates as an entity.”
Rubio said the agency had been “completely unresponsive,” and is “supposed to respond to policy directives at the State Department” but refuses to do so. The secretary of state has previously said the administration was reviewing the agency’s programs.
Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii)
said on Feb. 3 that he will place a blanket hold on all of Trump’s State Department nominees until the president reverses course on USAID.
Arjun Singh and Jack Phillips contributed to this report.
