Established by President John F. Kennedy in 1961, the U.S. Agency for International Development provides billions in humanitarian assistance overseas.
The U.S. Agency for International Development is at the center of a political firestorm after the Trump administration indicated it will shut it down as an independent agency and possibly move it under the State Department in a larger effort to crack down on federal bureaucracy.
USAID delivers billions of dollars in humanitarian aid overseas, funding that advocates say provides a critical lifeline to more than 100 countries at only a small fraction of the overall federal budget. Nonetheless, President Donald Trump over the weekend criticized it as being “run by a bunch of radical lunatics,” and tech billionaire Elon Musk, who heads his government efficiency initiative, called USAID a “criminal organization.”
The agency has an uncertain future. NBC News has reported that Trump administration officials have discussed placing USAID under the authority of the State Department, according to more than a dozen sources. On Monday, Musk announced that the administration was working to shutter the agency, a week after hundreds of USAID contractors were placed on unpaid leave and some were terminated following a freeze on U.S. foreign aid that Trump imposed worldwide.
USAID’s office in Washington was closed Monday, and employees were told to work remotely.
The developments come after USAID’s director of security and his deputy were put on administrative leave after reportedly denying Musk’s cost-cutting task force access to its secure systems Saturday.
What does USAID do and why are Musk and Trump so critical of it? Read on for more information.
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What is USAID?
USAID is the international humanitarian and development arm of the U.S. government, assisting nations in conflict and other “strategically important countries” by alleviating poverty, disease and other crises, according to a report by the Congressional Research Service.
Established by then-President John F. Kennedy in 1961 as an independent agency, the goal of USAID was two-pronged: to counter Soviet influence during the Cold War and to run various foreign assistance programs, based on the idea that American security was tied to stability and economic advancements in other nations.
More than 10,000 people work for USAID, about two-thirds of them overseas, the CRS says.
The agency addresses a wide range of needs, from women’s health to clean water. Jeremy Konyndyk, a former USAID official during the Obama and Biden administrations, described the agency’s work as urgent and said gutting it would disrupt vital public health initiatives at U.S.-funded clinics in other countries.
“To be very explicit about what is being turned off, the sort of things that are being stopped, are programs that support 20 million people on lifesaving HIV treatment right now,” said Konyndyk, who is president of Refugees International, a rights advocacy organization. “That’s a huge risk to those individuals, but it’s also a risk to the health of the world more broadly.”
How large is USAID’s budget and who has benefited from it?
In fiscal year 2023, USAID managed more than $40 billion in combined appropriations, according to the CRS, which notes that calculations of USAID’s budget can be imprecise. Forty billion dollars is less than 1% of the federal budget, according to The Washington Post.
USAID provided assistance to about 130 countries in fiscal year 2023. The CRS says the top 10 recipients were:
- Ukraine
- Ethiopia
- Jordan
- Congo
- Somalia
- Yemen
- Afghanistan
- Nigeria
- South Sudan
- Syria
In recent years, USAID “has also provided significant humanitarian, development and economic support” to Ukraine and countries affected by Russia’s invasion, as well as humanitarian assistance in the Gaza Strip, the CRS report adds.
What are the accusations against USAID?
Over the weekend and into Monday, Musk fired off a series of posts on X that accused the agency of corruption.
“Did you know that USAID, using YOUR tax dollars, funded bioweapon research, including COVID-19, that killed millions of people?” read one post, which cited a 2023 New York Post article about the origins of the pandemic.
Without citing evidence, Musk also called the agency “a radical-left political psy op” and a “crazy waste of money” and claimed “USAID has been paying media organizations to publish their propaganda.”
In a conversation on X Spaces overnight, Musk said he discussed USAID several times with Trump, who “agreed that we should shut it down.” When asked about USAID on Sunday, Trump told reporters, “It’s been run by a bunch of radical lunatics, and we’re getting them out.”
Konyndyk called Trump and Musk’s comments “an outrageous disinformation campaign” and said USAID works alongside various nongovernmental organizations and other private partners to properly address pressing global health issues.
“The way that the U.S. carries out relief and development programming overseas is in partnership,” he said. “It’s an incredibly capable ecosystem.”
What could happen next?
On Monday afternoon, Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters that he is now the acting director of USAID amid questions over its future but said he would delegate tasks to someone else. He also said the Trump administration plan was not “about ending the programs that USAID does, per se.”
“There are things that it does that are good and there are things that it does that we have strong questions about. It’s about the way it operates as an entity. And they’re supposed to take direction from the State Department, policy direction. They do not now,” he said, later adding, ”Their attitude is, we don’t have to answer to you because we are independent, we answer to no one. Well, that’s not true, and that will no longer be the case.”
Placing USAID under the State Department could change how it functions because in the past, the agency has been able to assist countries that the U.S. does not have diplomatic relations with, such as Iran.
It was not clear what the Trump administration’s timing for the next steps might be. Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, said Monday afternoon that he was placing a “blanket hold” on Trump’s nominees for the State Department in light of the situation.
“Dismantling USAID is illegal and makes us less safe. USAID was created by federal law and is funded by Congress. Donald Trump and Elon Musk can’t just wish it away with a stroke of a pen — they need to pass a law,” Schatz, who is on the Foreign Relations Committee, said in a statement.
