‘We’re Just Keeping Everybody Alive’: The Damage Done by the U.S.A.I.D. Freeze

When President John F. Kennedy asked Congress to establish the U.S. Agency for International Development in 1961, he rooted its mission in America’s strategic interests and its “moral obligations as a wise leader and good neighbor,” recognizing that poverty and instability threaten America’s prosperity and security. That convergence of interests and values, upheld across Republican and Democratic administrations, is now at risk.

U.S.A.I.D. is not a perfect agency. No government institution is. But from the Green Revolution to humanitarian relief to the fight against H.I.V., it has built a more stable world while advancing U.S. interests.

Now, under the guise of a foreign aid “review,” Elon Musk and President Trump have frozen U.S.A.I.D. money and activities and appear to be working to dismantle the agency and almost entirely eliminate foreign aid programs. The few waivers that have been granted have not unfrozen a significant amount of money. As the testimonials below from around the world show, the immediate impact has been damaging and chaotic.

It is not too late to salvage the agency and its mission. The agency’s partner organizations are hanging on and its overseas missions seem to have remained mostly intact, for now. The laws establishing U.S.A.I.D. in federal statute and its budget appropriation remain in force and unaltered.

But Mr. Musk’s assault appears to be operating outside of any lawful or congressional process, so Congress and the courts must intervene. Multiple lawsuits have been filed, with two prompting restraining orders. But saving foreign aid will ultimately come down to whether Congress uses its constitutional leverage over the administration.

Lawmakers should consider how they will explain in the coming years why America could no longer stop a disease outbreak overseas from reaching the homeland. Or why thousands of children who depended on lifesaving nutritional supplies made in American plants were left to die. Or why China is capitalizing on the vacuums left by America’s retreat.