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If you work in foreign aid, you may be too scared to open your next email alert at this point. U.S. President Donald Trump’s barrage of memos and executive orders last week probably upended your world. We’re hustling with scoop after scoop to bring you the latest so you can at least try to make sense of it all.
Stop, in the name of Trump
We broke the news Friday that the U.S. State Department put foreign aid on ice — ordering a pause on new spending and a stop-work order for existing grants and contracts.
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It instantly sent shock waves throughout the aid community, prompting questions, bewilderment, and fierce blowback. Shortly after the order was issued, two top congressional Democrats urged U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio to change his mind in order to “save lives.”
“In arbitrarily blocking our foreign assistance, we lose trust: from the people relying on this aid for survival whether in Gaza, Sudan, Haiti, Ukraine, or those standing in harm’s way delivering this aid,” wrote Rep. Gregory Meeks from New York, and Rep. Lois Frankel from Florida. “We urge you to immediately resume funding for ongoing U.S. foreign assistance programs so we can deliver on our commitments and save lives.”
Others emphasized the life-or-death repercussions of keeping USAID and its partners in a holding pattern.
“This halt interrupts critical life-saving work including clean water to infants, basic education for kids, ending the trafficking of girls, and providing medications to children and others suffering from disease,” the NGO alliance InterAction said in a statement. “It stops assistance in countries critical to U.S. interests, including Taiwan, Syria, and Pakistan. And, it halts decades of life-saving work through PEPFAR that helps babies to be born HIV-free.”
In a post on the social media platform X, Atul Gawande, who ran USAID’s health programs for three years, also gave specific examples of the real-life dangers on global health, including:
• Pauses the fight against a new mpox variant and Tanzania’s deadly Marburg outbreak, both of which could spread further.
• Ends bird flu monitoring in 49 countries, despite the virus having already caused one death in the U.S.
• Stops the flow of donated drugs to 20 million people living with HIV.
Read: US lawmakers urge Secretary of State Marco Rubio to unfreeze aid
Exclusive: State Department issues stop-work order on US aid
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Business unusual
The salvo of bombshell memos didn’t take a break for the weekend. On Saturday, USAID staff members received another memo — which my colleague Sara Jerving obtained a copy of — with more guidance on the aid freeze.
Ken Jackson, USAID assistant to the administrator for management and resources, emphasized that a pause on all foreign assistance “means a complete halt,” and that "every program will be thoroughly scrutinized.”
As part of that scrutiny, the State Department will develop review standards to ensure foreign assistance is aligned with Trump’s foreign policy agenda, USAID Acting Administrator Jason Gray told staffers the day before. This will then lead to decisions on whether to continue, modify, or terminate programs.
“Guidance provided specifies that the only exceptions to this pause are for emergency humanitarian food assistance and for government officials returning to their duty stations,” Jackson wrote in his Saturday memo.
He added that those using the humanitarian food assistance waiver should be prepared to provide “detailed information and justification.”
Any expenses beyond emergency food assistance require staff to go through a waiver process, which must be approved by Jackson and the director for foreign assistance, who will then submit it to the U.S. secretary of state for final approval.
“It is important to emphasize that it is no longer business as usual,” Jackson wrote, adding that voters gave Trump the mandate to deliver an “America First” policy and that staffers who did not adhere to the directive would face disciplinary action.
Scoop: USAID tells staffers ‘every program will be thoroughly scrutinized’
The purge: DEIA
Trump is also plowing full speed ahead to purge the government of anything that smacks of diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility, or DEIA. On Friday, he directed the heads of federal agencies to “take action to terminate, to the maximum extent allowed by law,” staffers of DEI offices.
As part of the government-wide campaign, USAID warned its implementing partners to pull the DEIA plug as well.
“All previously identified principal Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility (DEIA) awards have been sent termination notices and should not incur any further costs,” the USAID memo, seen by Sara, reads.
“With respect to all other ongoing awards: all DEIA activities under all contracts, grants, cooperative agreements, and other awards, including subcontracts and subawards, and programs domestic and abroad, are to cease immediately, with awards to be modified or terminated in accordance with applicable award terms and conditions,” it adds.
U.N. agencies apparently aren’t immune either. My colleague Colum Lynch saw a memo from the State Department to the International Organization for Migration instructing it to also cease all DEIA activities “at any level or in any activity, regardless of partner or program location.”
Scoop: USAID issues staff guidance on DEIA, foreign aid pause orders
ICYMI: USAID threatens ‘disciplinary action’ in DEIA crackdown
Gag economy
The orders to halt all U.S. foreign aid came as a surprise to many. Trump’s order to reinstate the Mexico City Policy, aka the “global gag rule,” did not.
That blocks U.S. federal funding to international NGOs that either provide abortions or information about them, even if other donors fund these services, my colleagues Elissa Miolene and Adva Saldinger write. Republican presidents institute it when in power, and Democrats rescind it when they are.
The executive order, issued late Friday, does not expand the Mexico City Policy to all foreign affairs funding, which some had anticipated. Still, the impact is far-reaching.
Studies have shown that the Mexico City Policy, even in its unexpanded form, increased the typical abortion rate in some countries by 40%. It also reduces the use of modern contraceptives by 13.5%, likely due to the number of clinics, programs, and services that are shuttered as a result.
Read: Trump reinstates Mexico City Policy, blocking US aid for abortion
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Geneva diva
Anti-abortion advocates scored a quieter victory last week as well — in the form of the “Geneva Consensus Declaration on Promoting Women’s Health and Strengthening the Family,” or GCD.
In 2020, Valerie Huber, the U.S. special representative for global women's health in the first Trump administration, helped launch the two-page, nonbinding “consensus declaration,” which combines standard commitments about health care with the assertion that “there is no international right to abortion.”
While a smorgasbord of countries signed the document — including Iraq, Pakistan, Sudan, Poland, and Saudi Arabia — it came at the tail end of Trump’s presidency and quickly fell by the wayside.
Now, Trump has breathed new life into the GCD, signing on as its 40th member nation. In a statement, Huber commended Trump for rejoining what she called a “first-of-its-kind global coalition of nations dedicated to improving women’s health, strengthening families, affirming that abortion is not an international human right, and upholding the sovereign right of nations to govern free from ideological colonialism.”
However, some say GCD is the one perpetuating ideological colonialism. “To its critics, the GCD represents an assault on health care access and a dangerous form of the very same cultural imperialism it claims to oppose — a global culture war call to arms against reproductive and gender rights that has been taken up most enthusiastically by right-wing governments with dubious human rights records,” writes my colleague Michael Igoe, who interviewed Huber shortly before the U.S. election.
ICYMI: Inside the global anti-abortion coalition preparing for Trump’s return
In other news
IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva offered Europe a piece of advice during the World Economic Forum's closing panel in Davos last week: “Believe in yourself.” [France 24]
U.N. chief António Guterres urged Rwandan forces to withdraw from the Democratic Republic of Congo and halt support for M23 fighters advancing on Goma, a city of over a million people near the eastern border. [VOA]
Africa CDC is urging African nations to boost local health funding — while exploring support from China, Japan, and South Korea — as U.S. programs such as the U.S. global AIDS initiative PEPFAR face potential cuts. [Bloomberg]
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About the author
Anna Gawel
Anna Gawel is the Managing Editor of Devex. She previously worked as the managing editor of The Washington Diplomat, the flagship publication of D.C.’s diplomatic community. She’s had hundreds of articles published on world affairs, U.S. foreign policy, politics, security, trade, travel and the arts on topics ranging from the impact of State Department budget cuts to Caribbean efforts to fight climate change. She was also a broadcast producer and digital editor at WTOP News and host of the Global 360 podcast. She holds a journalism degree from the University of Maryland in College Park.
