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USAID staff's wholesale purge, which now extends to foreign service officers and their families abroad, has become so brazen that it was announced on USAID’s defunct website.
Also in today’s edition: The U.S. aid freeze leaves virtually no corner of the globe untouched.
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Nail in the coffin?
You’d think that after these last two weeks, not much would shock the aid community. You’d be wrong.
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USAID’s website went dark last week — appropriate for the mood — but last night a stark message appeared on usaid.gov that perhaps seals the agency’s dark future. It announced that all USAID direct hire personnel globally — with a few exceptions — will be put on administrative leave as of Friday and those stationed abroad will be recalled from their posts within 30 days, with travel provided courtesy of the U.S. government.
“For USAID personnel currently posted outside the United States, the Agency, in coordination with missions and the Department of State, is currently preparing a plan, in accordance with all applicable requirements and laws, under which the Agency would arrange and pay for return travel to the United States within 30 days and provide for the termination of PSC and ISC contracts that are not determined to be essential,” it stated, referring to personal support contractors and institutional support contractors.
“The Agency will consider case-by-case exceptions and return travel extensions based on personal or family hardship, mobility or safety concerns, or other reasons," it added.
It’s perhaps the final gutting of an agency that two weeks ago was the largest donor in the world, employing more than 10,000 people in over 130 countries, my colleague Elissa Miolene writes.
The news came hot on the heels of Elissa’s scoop that after refusing to place thousands of staff members on administrative leave, USAID’s chief human resources officer was pushed out himself. Then, another 1,400 employees were ousted anyway.
Now, with pretty much all staff on ice, USAID is a shell of itself, spurring inevitable questions about how lifesaving aid waivers will be processed with no one around to process them.
Read:
• Most USAID staff cut from agency, marking end of world’s largest donor
• Scoop: Top USAID HR officer pushed out after refusing to fire more staff
• Scoop: USAID missions ‘urgently’ required to tally number of US staff
UNFPA vs. Trump
The United Nations Population Fund is used to U.S. funding yo-yos — Republican presidents cut, Democrats restore. But Trump’s latest foreign aid freeze is hitting harder. Last time, he let UNFPA spend preapproved funds. This time? No such luck.
“We were prepared for defunding as best as any agency could,” says Rachel Moynihan of UNFPA. Still, projects are collapsing, like one in Afghanistan employing 1,700 female health workers — vital in a country with soaring maternal mortality.
On the ground, it’s chaos, Devex Senior Global Reporter Colum Lynch writes. “If we have supplies heading to a port can we not unload them? If so, who is on the hook for paying for them?” one U.N. official vents. Small NGOs? “For them, 90 days is a death sentence.”
Legal challenges? Maybe. But quoting the U.N. Charter — which bars U.N. staff from taking orders from governments — won’t faze an administration that shrugs at global norms. “This is like a Catch-22,” one official sighs.
What’s at risk? U.S. funding covers 11% of UNFPA’s budget. Programs on the chopping block:
• In Afghanistan, 9 million people will lose services and 1,700 health workers will be out of work.
• In Gaza, 50,000 pregnant women will lose care.
• In Bangladesh, Ukraine, Pakistan, Yemen, and Sudan, millions of people will lose access to health services, emergency aid, and gender-based violence support.
UNFPA’s scrambling for waivers, but time — and money — are running out.
Scoop: UN Population Fund thought it prepared for the worst — it didn’t
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Red flags
Just a day before USAID’s global programs were ordered to stop work and three days after their funding was paused by Donald Trump, a memo from the agency’s Inspector General Paul Martin revealed mounting frustrations — mainly around uncooperative partners, insufficient vetting, and accountability gaps.
Sent to (now-demoted) Acting Administrator Jason Gray and (now-resigned) Chief of Staff Matt Hopson, the memo outlined major issues, including U.N. agencies and foreign NGOs dragging their feet — or outright refusing — to report misconduct such as fraud, abuse, and corruption to Martin’s office. “Direct reporting to [Office of the Inspector General] from U.N. agencies is limited and at times significantly delayed if not altogether absent,” Martin wrote.
Case in point: Between 2019 and 2024, the World Food Programme reported 29 misconduct cases to the Office of the Inspector General — but disclosed 519 cases to USAID more broadly, Devex Senior Reporter Sara Jerving writes. This lag “delays our ability to initiate critical initial investigative steps such as preserving evidence and obtaining witness testimony,” Martin said.
The memo also says that U.N. agencies often hide behind “privileges and immunities” to dodge fully participating in investigations, and flagged what it described as USAID’s insufficient vetting for ties to terrorism and corruption.
All of this suggests that under the Trump administration, partners may have to change the way they’re accountable to the U.S. government — and that makes sense, a USAID employee tells Sara.
Read: USAID inspector general warned of oversight failures before aid shutdown
Ripple effect
The U.K.’s Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office is sounding the alarm: The U.S. foreign aid freeze isn’t just a 90-day blip. It could leave lasting scars on global humanitarian aid and America’s reputation.
A memo to senior staffers warns of a potential “seismic impact” if USAID is folded into the State Department, gutting its capacity to deliver aid and shifting focus away from the U.N. Sustainable Development Goals. The U.K. plans to monitor fallout in conflict zones, tracking health crises, migration shifts, and disruptions to multilateral organizations, my colleague Jesse Chase-Lubitz writes.
While a waiver exists for “life-saving humanitarian assistance,” FCDO says there’s no sign of services resuming due to staffing gaps, policy confusion, and radio silence from Washington. Global health programs are particularly vulnerable, with the U.S. slashing staff at the President’s Malaria Initiative, withdrawing from WHO, and jeopardizing HIV efforts such as PEPFAR.
The memo also flags the return of the Mexico City Policy, aka the “global gag rule,” threatening reproductive health services worldwide — and even some U.K.-funded programs if partners cave to U.S. funding terms.
International financial institutions might weather the storm — if the freeze stays under 180 days. But if it drags on, expect budget shortfalls and credit issues. The World Bank’s International Development Association, or IDA, which funds the world’s poorest nations, could lose $17 billion in projected financing if the U.S. pulls out.
On Tuesday, U.K. development minister Anneliese Dodds declined to criticize the USAID shutdown publicly, saying Trump “was elected by the US population with millions of votes – it’s ultimately a US policy decision.”
Scoop: FCDO says USAID merger would have 'seismic impact'
Strong words
“Brazen and illegal.” That’s how a group of 37 U.S. senators described “attempts to destroy” USAID in a letter to U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
“Every administration has the right to review and adjust ongoing assistance programming. However, attempting to arbitrarily turn off core functions of a critical U.S. national security agency, without Congressional consideration, or any metric-based review and absent legal authority to do so, is unprecedented and deeply disturbing,” the letter from a group of Democratic senators reads.
It asks questions about Elon Musk; disclosure of classified information; why senior USAID officials were placed on administrative leave; and who was in charge of implementing the massive furlough at USAID. It also requests more information about waivers and how soon “legally mandated foreign assistance activities” will resume, my colleague Adva Saldinger writes.
The letter followed a resolution introduced by Sen. Chris Coons, a Democrat from Delaware, trying to get the Senate to reaffirm the importance of USAID in advancing national security interests, but his efforts were met with an objection from the top Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
Read: In letter to Rubio, senators question efforts to 'destroy' USAID
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In other news
Billionaire philanthropist and spiritual leader Aga Khan IV died Tuesday at the age of 88. [BBC]
Big polluters Australia, India, South Africa, and the European Union are likely to miss submitting their new climate targets for 2035. [Financial Times]
Top U.N. humanitarian official Bruno Lemarquis has urged rebel group M23 to reopen the airport in Goma to facilitate relief operations in the Democratic Republic of Congo. [UN News]
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About the author
Helen Murphy
Helen is an award-winning journalist and Senior Editor at Devex, where she edits coverage on global development in the Americas. Based in Colombia, she previously covered war, politics, financial markets, and general news for Reuters, where she headed the bureau, and for Bloomberg in Colombia and Argentina, where she witnessed the financial meltdown. She started her career in London as a reporter for Euromoney Publications before moving to Hong Kong to work for a daily newspaper.
