The move will fully absorb all remaining USAID functions into the State Department effective July 1, and according to a reduction in force notice to remaining staff, will “obviate” the need for an independent USAID
US President Donald Trump’s administration is moving to formally end the US Agency for International Development (USAID), notifying the remaining employees they will be terminated and the agency will be merged with the State Department, The Hill reported.
The move will fully absorb all remaining USAID functions into the State Department effective July 1, and according to a reduction in force notice to remaining staff, will “obviate” the need for an independent USAID.
By September 2, USAID’s operations will have been substantially transferred to State or otherwise wound down, the notice stated. Jeremy Lewin, a former Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) staffer who joined USAID last week, said the State Department “will seek to retire USAID’s independent operation, consistent with applicable law,” as per The Hill.
“As Secretary Rubio has said, following congressional consultations, the State Department intends to assume responsibility for many of USAID’s functions and its ongoing programming,” Lewin wrote.
“It will also obviate the need for USAID to continue operating as an independent establishment. Accordingly, the Department will seek to retire USAID’s independent operation, consistent with applicable law.”
It’s not clear which specific USAID programs would survive the transfer, as per The Hill.
According to a memo to Congress obtained by CNN, just 900 employees remain at an agency that once employed 10,000, as per The Hill.
USAID employees will be terminated either on July 1 or September 2, with those in the later group responsible for “winding down” the agency, The Hill reported.
“The remaining USAID personnel will then supervise the responsible decommissioning of USAID assets and the wind-down of the Agency’s independent operations,” Lewin wrote.
In a separate move on late Thursday, Trump signed an executive order directing a number of agencies to suspend union bargain rights. Included on the list was USAID as the administration classified it as a national security agency.
State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce addressed the matter at a news briefing later in the day.
She said department officials “have notified Congress on their intent to undertake a reorganisation that would involve realigning certain USAID functions to the department by July 1, 2025, and discontinuing the remaining USAID functions that do not align with administrative priorities”.
Bruce also denied that the dismantling of USAID would affect the country’s ability to respond to international disasters like Friday’s earthquakes in Myanmar and Thailand.
“ We are ready to move now. So there has been no impact on our ability to perform those duties, those requests for aid if and when they come in,” she said.
USAID was established under Congress’s authority through the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961. But it does operate under the secretary of state.
Until the start of Trump’s second term as president, the agency was one of the largest distributors of foreign aid in the world — but that activity largely stopped when the president implemented a freeze on foreign assistance.
In 2023 alone, the US distributed approximately $72bn in foreign aid. USAID was responsible for distributing about half of that sum.
But Rubio has since announced on social media that 83 percent of USAID’s contracts have been cancelled.
US media obtained an internal memorandum to USAID employees warning that all positions — save those required by law — would be eliminated. Bruce, the State Department spokesperson, asked about the scope of those changes during her briefing.
“With any major change, there’s going to be disruption,” she said, adding that the layoffs were not unexpected.
“We’ve been waiting for this conclusion. It has arrived. I can’t speak to the number of people who will not be a foreign service officer at this point. I can’t say if it’s going to be every single one.”
“ It’s a restructuring essentially,” she continued. “Like any restructuring, there will inevitably be disruptions from Secretary Rubio down. We are committed to ensuring that USAID personnel remain safe and that the agency’s ongoing lifesaving aid programmes remain both intact and operational.”
Bruce tied the layoffs to the Trump administration’s campaign to eliminate alleged “waste and fraud and abuse”, a project led by adviser and billionaire businessman Elon Musk.
Already, in February, USAID saw large-scale cuts to its workforce. About 1,600 people were laid off, and all but a handful of the remaining staff were placed on leave, including those stationed abroad.
Its headquarters in Washington, DC, was also shuttered, and workers were given 15-minute time slots to enter the building and quickly collect their belongings.
Earlier this month, a federal judge issued a ruling that Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) “likely violated the United States Constitution in multiple ways” by dismantling USAID.
Judge Theodore Chuang wrote that Musk and DOGE “deprived the public’s elected representatives in Congress of their constitutional authority to decide whether, when and how to close down an agency created by Congress”.
Through a temporary injunction, Chuang ordered DOGE and Musk to stop their efforts to slash USAID’s staff and contracts. But it is not clear whether that order applies to actions taken by the secretary of state.
But on Friday afternoon, a federal appeals court lifted Chuang’s injunction, allowing DOGE to proceed with its cuts.
Musk has previously boasted that he was involved in “feeding USAID into the wood chipper”.
