US appeals court backs Trump in fight over foreign aid freeze

A U.S. federal appeals court cleared the way Wednesday for the Trump administration’s dismantling of foreign aid, scrapping an earlier order that had forced the State Department to pay out billions of dollars in frozen foreign aid previously approved by Congress. The 2-1 decision came after months of back-and-forth in Washington, D.C., with a group of nonprofits suing the Trump administration on Feb. 11. The next day, the U.S. Agency for International Development’s biggest contractors followed suit, with DAI, Chemonics, and others filing a case of their own. The organizations all argued that the government’s foreign aid freeze — which in late January brought international assistance to a halt — was unconstitutional and had resulted in “unlawful actions that are harming and will harm countless individuals and entities.” Those two lawsuits were ultimately joined together, and for the next several weeks, U.S. District Judge Amir Ali mandated — over and over again — that the Trump administration pay the organizations the money Congress had already allocated. Now, the three-judge panel on the appeals court has said Ali erred in his orders, and that the organizations lacked the standing to challenge U.S. President Donald Trump’s aid cuts under the legal avenue that they chose. “They may not bring a freestanding constitutional claim if the underlying alleged violation and claimed authority are statutory,” wrote Circuit Judge Karen LeCraft Henderson, who was appointed by former Republican President Ronald Reagan. In other words, the organizations’ claims aren’t constitutional, Henderson wrote — they’re rooted in statute. While the former claim argues that the government violated the U.S. Constitution, a statutory claim argues that it broke a law passed by Congress. The plaintiffs’ argument hinged on the constitutional separation of powers and specifically the Impoundment Control Act, which restricts the executive branch’s ability to refuse to spend money that Congress has already approved. The judges said that only the U.S. Comptroller General, the head of the nonpartisan Government Accountability Office, can bring such a case to court. Because of that, the judges tossed the part of the district court’s order that dealt with impoundment, clearing the way for the administration to withhold paying foreign assistance funds Congress had allocated for fiscal 2024, which ends Sept. 30. Still, the court did not answer the core question that’s been circling the case since its inception: whether the administration’s unilateral decision to block congressionally appropriated money is constitutional. The move was celebrated by Pam Bondi, the U.S. attorney general, soon after. “Another @TheJusticeDept victory in court for President Trump’s agenda!” Bondi posted on the social media platform X on Wednesday. “We will continue to successfully protect core Presidential authorities from judicial overreach.” But in a dissenting opinion, Judge Florence Pan said the courts do have the right to examine cases where a president appears to have unlawfully refused to spend money already set aside by Congress. Pan — who was appointed by former Democratic President Joe Biden — wrote that the majority opinion “misconstrues the separation-of-powers claim brought by the grantees, misapplies precedent, and allows Executive Branch officials to evade judicial review of constitutionally impermissible actions.” “According to the majority, the President’s refusal to execute a law for policy reasons is merely a violation of the statute that he declines to follow and does not present a constitutional cause of action,” she continued. “My colleagues thus avoid reviewing the President’s actions by denying that any constitutional issues are even in play.” Lauren Bateman, the lead attorney representing several of the organizations, said that her team will be pushing the case forward by seeking “further review from the court,” while the AIDS Vaccine Advocacy Coalition, or AVAC, one of the plaintiffs in the case, said it was “moving swiftly” to petition the full 15-judge D.C. Circuit Court for review. “Today’s decision is a significant setback for the rule of law and risks further erosion of basic separation of powers principles,” said Bateman, an attorney with Public Citizen Litigation Group, in a Wednesday statement. “Our lawsuit will continue regardless as we seek permanent relief from the Administration’s unlawful termination of the vast majority of foreign assistance.” Most expect the case to eventually end up in the Supreme Court, which is stacked with conservative judges — three of whom were appointed by President Donald Trump during his first term.