By the weekend, the Trump administration is planning to withdraw staff from overseas posts
The US Agency for International Development is Going to the Front of a Rolling Stone: Three Congressional Sources Associated with the State Department’s Overnight Staff Recall
The United States Agency for International Development personnel stationed overseas are going to be pulled by this weekend according to three sources with knowledge of internal planning.
The deputy assistant secretary of state for global operations is working with the department to recall USAID employees to the United States by Saturday.
It continued: “I understand the feasibility concerns as well as the emotional toll this will take on those impacted as well as the team assisting. A team of support workers has been asked to be in the space immediately.
A plan to recall overseas staff was described to NPR by current and former federal government officials, who were not authorized to speak publicly.
On late Monday night, a memo went out to State Department employees asking that overseas missions provide the number of USAID employees and dependent family members at their locations.
About two-thirds of USAID’s 10,000 employees serve overseas in more than 60 country and regional missions, according to a January 2025 report by the Congressional Research Service.
The abrupt recall means employees have just days to figure out where they are, how to take children out of school, how to arrange petcare, and how to get their belongings back. Meanwhile, withdrawing over a thousand foreign service officers and their families will likely be extremely costly, multiple diplomatic sources tell NPR.
Large numbers of USAID employees have been placed on administrative leave or locked out of their emails and work servers in recent days, including those working on a variety of what they say are critical public health missions. USAID staffers say this demonstrates that the emergency waiver application process is ineffective and isn’t ensuring that aid workers can continue serving vulnerable populations.
A month after taking office, Trump signed an executive order freezing foreign aid to the United States, which makes up less than 1% of the federal budget. The administration later said that lifesaving work was exempt and could continue. But USAID employees and officials from non-profit organizations say they are still being blocked from doing vital work on ending the global HIV/AIDS epidemic.
Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) Service has plowed through several government agencies since President Donald Trump took office last month, proposing sweeping changes to federal infrastructure. But no agency has been gutted as thoroughly as USAID. A cadre of young DOGE agents have been stationed in USAID’s headquarters since last week; after reportedly wresting control of USAID’s secure systems and placing key personnel on administrative leave, the DOGE team began cutting off staff email accounts on a rolling, seemingly random basis, with no guidance or explanation, employees claim. “It’s been absolutely hellish,” says a current USAID employee who lost access to their email on Monday morning.
WIRED interviewed eight current and former USAID employees and contractors for this story, several of whom directly work on the agency’s HIV and AIDS programs. They were granted anonymity due to fears of retaliation and because they were not authorized to speak publicly about the agency. USAID did not respond to requests for comment.
“We spent the weekend feeding USAID into the wood chipper,” Musk said on social media Sunday. Could I go to a few great parties? Did that instead.”
Reviewing USAID’s spending after Rubio’s letter to senators and aides concerned by the inauguration of the Secretary of State for AIDS Relief
The program, known as the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, orPEPFAR, was granted an emergency Humanitarian Waiver by the US Agency for International Development.
“Your money is being unfrozen but you can’t contact the people who actually froze it,” a senior official at an HIV/AIDS organization told WIRED. Efforts are made to free up the lifesaving work, but they are still frustrated by a bigger communication blockage.
Republicans in Congress have shown little willingness to get together with the new administration, even though they have reversed past decisions on how the government spends money.
Last week, the concerns were fueled by a memo from the Office of Management and Budget instructing federal agencies to pause all federal grants and other payments. The White House said it will continue its effort to rein in spending despite the memo being withdrawn because of a court challenge.
The senate’s number two leader told NPR that the administration has a right to demand accountability and transparency in the programs.
Barrasso pointed to Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s comments on Monday raising concerns about getting information about USAID’s spending. He said in the letter to the committees that he was reviewing and reorganizing the operations of the agency.
Congress authorized spending for the agency through the annual appropriations process, but many Republicans are now saying that a review of foreign aid programs is warranted.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., maintained Tuesday that USAID wasn’t closing down, but told reporters the Trump administration has “the right to review funding and how those decisions are made and what priorities are being funded.”
Reply to Senator Cornyn, Rep. Susan Collins, and a Sen. J. Boozman: The response to the DOGE and Musk memos
The reaction to Musk and the DOGE initiative has underscored the already sharp divide on Capitol Hill in the opening weeks of the new administration. Democrats have sought to portray Musk’s work as undemocratic, while Republicans have said that it’s time for a review of foreign aid.
“There’s a lot of the spending that goes on through USAID that does not appear to be consistent with U.S. policy, and so I’m all for a review to make sure that taxpayer dollars are going to programs and people that are consistent with our government’s policies,” Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, told reporters.
Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, said the agency was due for a review, especially when it comes to overhead costs. But she was a rare GOP lawmaker who publicly raised questions about how Musk was proceeding.
“The law is every specific and if there’s going to be a reorganization of USAID then Congress has to be informed 15 days in advance and a detailed explanation of any changes has to be provided.”
Collins said she did not believe that the letter was in keeping with the requirements of the law. Collins did not say what her panel would do in response.
She said that she believed that Musk’s assistants may have had access to classified information, but were not cleared by the government.
“I don’t think we know exactly what he is doing right now,” said another GOP appropriator, Sen. John Boozman of Arkansas. “We are in the process of finding out what the path forward is,” he told NPR, adding that he expected a briefing on the details of DOGE’s plans.
Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., did acknowledge that an executive branch move to turn off a federal agency “runs afoul of the Constitution in the strictest sense.” But he argued that former President Joe Biden took similar steps.
“It’s not uncommon for presidents to flex a little bit on where they can spend and where they can stop spending,” Tillis said. “That is not something that anybody should bellyache about.”
The Biden administration’s effort to forgive student loan debt was an example of an administration stepping on Congress’ spending authority, said Sen. Josh Hawley. The push remains the highest level of lawlessness vis–vis Congress and the presidency in my lifetime.
It’s unclear what the White House or Musk will demand in any spending deal. Two weeks into the Trump administration’s frenzy of executive actions, there’s no sign that Republicans will stand in the way of more efforts to get their way.
The OMB action last week involved trillions in federal spending for both international and domestic programs that Congress debated and authorized. Few GOP lawmakers publicly objected, even as they admitted their families in districts across the country were worried about the future of assistance such as school lunches and day care. The pause also risked funding for projects many Republicans inserted into spending bills for roads, water projects and other community programs in their states and districts.
Republican lawmakers will soon have another chance to control federal spending. Agencies are scheduled to run out of money on March 14 unless Congress approves legislation to avoid a partial shutdown.
