Devex Pro Insider: Tracking Trump and sticking together

It’s been a whirlwind week in the world of global development. Shortly before I signed off the previous edition of this newsletter, the Trump administration announced it was suspending almost all U.S. foreign assistance pending a review. In the week since then, my inbox and social media feeds have been full of messages from people who have lost work, organization leaders who are unsure how to respond, and global development professionals trying to make sense of the situation and the impact on the people they work with. Following the announcement of the aid freeze, we held an emergency briefing for our Devex Pro members. There was a huge level of interest in this event — and on that note, I want to apologize to anyone who had problems joining. In an unprecedented situation, we reached capacity within seconds of the event starting, so some of you received links to watch via YouTube instead. We have upgraded our systems to ensure it doesn’t happen again, and you can catch up on the full recording here. With this in mind, we’ll be holding more Devex Pro briefings to help you navigate these first few weeks of the administration. You can join the next one tomorrow, Feb. 3, at 12 p.m. ET. If you can’t join live, register to receive the recording and invitations to further briefings in the coming weeks. Then, on Feb. 5, Devex President Raj Kumar will be speaking to Mark Dybul, the former head of the Global Fund and PEPFAR, about the future of global health politics. Pro members are invited to join this call. Coming up: As the situation plays out, we’ll also continue to convene events for our Pro members covering the world of global development beyond U.S. aid. On Feb. 10, join us to discuss development finance trends in 2025 — a year that could be pivotal for the sector. Also in today’s edition: Discover the Devex Trump tracker, the community debates how to talk about development in the face of crisis, and questions over the European response. Jessica Abrahams Editor, Devex Pro Bits and pieces Trump tracker. In these first two weeks of the administration, news has been coming thick and fast. First, the administration announced a 90-day freeze on foreign assistance spending, and then days later added a stop-work order. Soon it extended the freeze to all federal loans and grants but then rescinded that extension. While it initially said that only “emergency food assistance” would be exempt from the foreign assistance freeze, it then expanded that to “life-saving humanitarian assistance,” although there are still questions about what exactly that includes. If you’re struggling to keep up, you’re not alone. My colleague Justin Sablich is running a fantastic tracker, which is updated daily with the latest news from the Trump administration affecting global development and foreign assistance. I recommend bookmarking it now. In the past week in particular there’s been a heavy impact on jobs. That includes: • Sixty senior USAID executives who were placed on administrative leave for allegedly not complying with recent executive orders. • Five thousand jobs that are at risk at the International Organization for Migration. • Thousands more jobs at risk across Washington, D.C. • Five hundred contractors who were furloughed from USAID’s Bureau for Humanitarian Assistance — along with stories of hundreds more at other USAID bureaus. Yet as one of those contractors wrote on LinkedIn: “You would expect that the overwhelming concern from my colleagues would be at the loss of our livelihood. However, I can assure you that it was not. Across the halls of USAID, the recurring concern I heard from friends, as they were packing away the artwork and award certificates on their desks, was for the communities impacted by crises and in need of life-saving humanitarian assistance.” Talking points. As U.S. aid faces an existential threat, many in the sector are hoping that speaking the language of the Trump administration will help. In the lead-up to the Jan. 20 inauguration, many U.S.-based development leaders were already advising the sector to shift the focus from moral to geopolitical arguments in support of aid. During a Devex Pro event in December last year, Ndidi Okonkwo Nwuneli, CEO of the ONE Campaign, said it was clear that “We need to change the way we talk about development, with an emphasis on return on investment” for the American people. Other development leaders on the call echoed that sentiment, suggesting it might be possible to use Trump’s concern with geopolitical power dynamics to make the case for U.S. leadership in foreign assistance. However, not everyone’s happy with that decision. On LinkedIn last week, Marina Kobzeva, a long-time humanitarian professional, criticized this choice of language — particularly pointing to a statement from U.S. INGO network InterAction, which she said “capitulates” to the administration. “I know the authors had their backs against the wall,” she acknowledged. “They had to make an impossible choice: speak the language of power or lose vital funds, save the principles or save the programmes.” But, she wondered, “Do the ends justify the means? … If we abandon our principles to save our programmes, what exactly are we saving?” She also worried about the impact on relationships with global south partners. Many commenters on LinkedIn supported her points, and she’s not the only one to have expressed concern about this. The debate touches on what is likely to become a fundamental divide — pragmatism vs. principles — as the community navigates life under Trump 2.0. Fight back? Over in the U.K. (and undoubtedly elsewhere), aid advocates are wondering what the government might be able to do to fill the gaps left by Trump’s policies. During a Devex Pro event last week, Romilly Greenhill, CEO of the British NGO network Bond, noted that the U.K. will be leading both the G7 and G20 within the time frame of Trump’s second term, creating an “important opportunity to position itself as being on the side of multilateralism.” But Tamsyn Barton, former chief commissioner of the Independent Commission on Aid Impact, said that falling aid budgets across Europe will make it “really tough” to mitigate the damage and that we might be more likely to see China filling the space, at least in terms of multilateral leadership. Last time Trump implemented an expanded version of the global gag rule, several European countries stepped up in a bid to mitigate the impact, founding the She Decides initiative. But although the U.K. hosted a high-profile summit on sexual and reproductive health and rights, it stayed away from She Decides, which some speculated was for diplomatic reasons. In the years since many of the key donors who funded She Decides — including Sweden and the Netherlands — have cut their aid budgets, leaving questions over what the European response will be, if anything, this time around. It comes as Switzerland last week cut or completely withdrew funding from several U.N. agencies, including UNAIDS, following a parliamentary vote to slash the foreign aid budget. ✉️ Do you have insights into any of this week’s bits and pieces? Let me know by replying to this email. Moving on Alexandra Machado Soergel is starting as lead, water and climate at the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies. Marco De Ponte will start as CEO of Hivos in April. He is currently secretary general of ActionAid Italy. WaterEquity has appointed Aleem Remtula as head of private equity and infrastructure investments. Ky'okusinga Kirunga is the new head of external relations and resource mobilization at Africa Public Health Foundation. Nicole Bibbins Sedaca, formerly of Freedom House, has joined the George W. Bush Institute as the Kelly and David Pfiel fellow. The Tent Partnership for Refugees has appointed a new leadership team across Europe and the Americas. It includes: Brandon Yoder, an outgoing U.S. State Department official, as vice president of the Americas; Tim Cole as vice president of Europe, who joins from the ONE Campaign; Haiwen Lu Langworth, who is promoted to vice president of global communications and marketing; Philip Kyle, who is promoted to director of Communications for Europe; and Crissy Vicendese, who is promoted to director of global brand marketing. Did we miss one? Is there a change on the horizon? Let us know at devexpro@devex.com. Up next Future of ODA. A panel at the Center for Global Development will be considering “whether the concept of ODA (and how it is counted) needs to be modified to ensure it remains fit for purpose.” Speakers include Antón Leis García, director of the Spanish development agency, and Susanna Gable, deputy director, development policy and finance at the Gates Foundation. Feb. 4. ECOSOC. The U.N.’s Economic and Social Council, which helps to coordinate its sustainable development activities, has both its Partnership Forum and Coordination Segment this week. Both are focusing on the official theme of the high-level political forum on sustainable development due to be held later this year — “Advancing sustainable, inclusive, science- and evidence-based solutions for the 2030 Agenda,” which doesn’t narrow things down much. There’ll also be a focus on the SDGs due to be reviewed at this year’s HLPF: namely SDG3 on health and well-being; SDG5 on gender equality; SDG8 on decent work and economic growth; SDG14 on life below water; and SDG17 on partnerships for the goals. Feb 5-7. Gender equality. ODI Global is hosting an event on the role that gender equality will play in EU foreign policy under the new European Commission. As the U.S. steps back, will the EU step forward? Feb. 6.