Samantha Cooper, a contractor who was terminated at the U.S.A.I.D. Department of Human and Biological Services, reported to InterAction
Samantha Cooper, a contractor whose employment was terminated, had been working in maternal and child health and nutrition at the aid agency, and was set to begin a new job this past Monday in the Office of H.I.V./AIDS. Within days she was straining to make ends meet as she was excited about an upcoming career milestone.
The decimation of U.S.A.I.D. has set off a domino effect, as contractors, nongovernmental organizations and consulting firms that rely on funding from the agency for their projects also are forced to make cuts. At least 10,000 American jobs in the sector have already disappeared, according to InterAction, which represents a number of organizations specializing in foreign aid.
Some speculated that the number of people retained might climb slightly higher, as bureau and regional leaders fought to preserve as many positions as possible to continue the agency’s lifesaving work.
It was not immediately clear how many employees had been deemed essential. On Thursday afternoon, senior U.S.A.I.D. leaders were told that the Trump administration planned to reduce the agency’s staff to about 290, according to three people informed directly about the details of the call. The number of retained employees was brought to the attention of senior agency officials by Friday morning according to two people familiar with the internal guidance.
An email was sent to you stating that you were expected to keep working and that you would be notified if something didn’t work out.
On Thursday, a subset of U.S.A.I.D. employees began receiving notices that they had been deemed “essential,” meaning they would not be suspended or laid off — for now.
He, like many others, spoke on the condition of anonymity, as those still on the agency’s payroll have been instructed not to publicly discuss the changes underway. Employees are worried that disobeying the order will jeopardize their pensions and other benefits, though it’s not certain if the Trump administration will honor their obligations.
“Two weeks ago we were two gainfully employed people with onward assignments, and now we’ve seen the entire industry decimated and we’re returning to the U.S. without jobs,” he said.
Mr. Rubio, who has assumed overall authority of U.S.A.I.D., tried to tamp down the fears, encouraging people to apply for waivers to delay travel and arguing that the Trump administration was “not trying to be disruptive to people’s personal lives.”
Employees with kids had to decide whether to take their kids out of school immediately or wait until the end of the school year. Some individuals with medical conditions worried about the dangers of travel and the status of their health care. Several agonized over what to do about pets, because it was not possible to procure the paperwork necessary to enter the United States in just a few weeks.
The announcement gave Foreign Service officers just 30 days to depart their posts and return to the United States if they wanted the U.S. government to pay for their relocation, forcing nearly the entire diplomatic staff to plan the sort of swift exit that normally only takes place during coups and wars.
The order was a temporary reprieve to approximately 2,700 direct hires of the U.S. Agency for International Development who were on administrative leave or set to be placed on leave by midnight Friday. The agency and contractors panicked for the past couple of weeks as the Trump administration began to lay off staff and signaled it would decimate the agency.
The thousands of people who work for the U.S. government’s main agency for humanitarian aid and disaster relief have been on the front lines of efforts to fight famine, contain virulent infectious diseases like H.I.V. and Ebola, and rebuild infrastructure in impoverished and war-torn countries.
Source: Live Updates: Security Questions Swirl After Musk Team Views Treasury Data
Security and Finance Issues: How Do I Wanna Be? When the U.S.A.D. Starts Sailing, and What Will I Do?
She said in a telephone interview that she had to file for unemployment because it wouldn’t cover rent or food stamps. Her medical coverage ran out on Friday last week.
She said that she had co-workers going through I.V.F. that lost their benefits as a result, and people with cancer treatments and parents on Hospice. I feel very fortunate to say that this is what I am struggling with. I know there are so many others having to deal with that, and it is literally going to break them.”
That was the fear of a Foreign Service officer in Asia, who was told by their superiors that the U.S.A.I.D. had no funding, when they discovered that a family member was in danger and needed to be evacuated. Their only option, the officer was told, would be to immediately return to the United States, where they have nowhere to live, and leave their belongings and pets behind.
She worried that if she and her husband were to be out of work they would have to live off savings they had intended to put toward a house.
“It just feels like the entire sector is sinking, and so how am I going to find a job?” she said, speaking on the condition of anonymity, like others, for fear of retaliation. “All I know is development, all I know is public health — I’ve dedicated my life to this. What other skills do I have?
Source: Live Updates: Security Questions Swirl After Musk Team Views Treasury Data
When U.S.A.I.D. is illegal, and when does it stop? A global consulting firm that was forced to close its doors
Employees of nongovernmental organizations and companies that rely on U.S.A.I.D. funding said they had effectively been blocked from accessing any funding through the agency’s accounting system, and in some cases, had months of expenses with no guarantee that the federal government would reimburse them.
Small companies are more often hit than large ones, and an example of that is Resonance, a consulting firm that employed about 150 people around the world. The firm did most of its business with the company before it fell into a deep hole. It has bills going back to November that the agency has yet to cover, Steve Schmida, its co-founder, said in an interview.
“We’re being forced to carry a huge amount of cost with no clarity if and when we will get paid or reimbursed,” Mr. Schmida said, adding that he had to lay off almost 90 percent of his U.S.-based staff. He is leaving his job to free up funds so he can keep his business going.
The United States spends less on foreign aid than any other country, but that still makes it the largest aid donor in the world. USAID distributes between $40 billion and $60 billion per year—almost a quarter of all global humanitarian aid. While in recent years the largest shares of that aid have gone to Ukraine, Israel, and Afghanistan, the agency also distributes billions of dollars to Latin America, sub-Saharan Africa, and Southeast Asia, where it primarily helps promote food security, health and sanitation, and education efforts.
Secretary of State Marco Marco said that Musk shutting down is not about getting rid of foreign aid. If the agency restarts operations to provide humanitarian assistance like famine support, HIV prevention and more it will be likely to end its climate related work under the Trump administration. It would be a big blow to the Paris climate agreement, just like Trump withdrawing the US from the international pact. By clawing back billions of dollars that Congress has already committed to the fight against global warming, the US is poised to derail climate progress far beyond its own borders.
Musk said on X on Sunday that the USAID is a criminal organization. It’s time for it to die. (The agency is codified in federal law, and court challenges are likely to argue that Musk’s actions are themselves illegal.)
The new Department of Government Efficiency has shut down the website, locked employees out of their email accounts, and closed the Washington office.
The US Agency for International Development, the independent federal agency that delivers humanitarian aid and economic development funding around the world, has been shut down by Donald Trump as part of a broad effort to cut government spending. On his first day in office, President Trump issued an executive order pausing all USAID funding, and the agency subsequently issued a stop-work order to nearly all funding recipients, from soup kitchens in Sudan to the global humanitarian group Mercy Corps.