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.
None of those effects point to a safer or more prosperous future for America.
The following testimonies were gathered by the Times Opinion staff. Some individuals spoke on condition of anonymity. Some interviews have been condensed and lightly edited for clarity.
Africa
Sudan: Humanitarian aid
U.S.A.I.D. has helped support the network of Emergency Response Rooms across Sudan, civilian-led groups that provide food and other humanitarian aid to hundreds of thousands of people during the country’s continuing civil war, according to Hajooj Kuka, an external communications officer for the E.R.R.s. Famine has already been confirmed in or is projected to take hold in 10 parts of the country.
“At this moment, we’re trying our best to utilize the resources we have, but the way we’re doing it is using all the money we have from somewhere else. Really quickly, it’s just going to deplete. We have no clue if U.S.A.I.D. money is going to kick back in, or it’s just gone,” he said.
“We’re just keeping everybody alive, and Sudan is on the verge of an outbreak of famine… A week of not finding food would actually mean a lot of death.”
“I’m not sure who the United States is. At this point it’s hard for me to tell.”
Kenya: H.I.V. and tuberculosis treatment
The U.S.A.I.D. freeze has devastated tuberculosis and maternal H.I.V. programs at the Mathare North Health Center, which serves some of Nairobi’s poorest.
The X-ray machine that had been operated by workers supported by U.S.A.I.D. grants to diagnose tuberculosis is no longer running because the personnel trained to operate it were forced out of work. “Some patients will go home undetected and they will spread more deadly, multidrug-resistant TB,” said Margaret Odera, a local community health worker. “Viruses and bacteria don’t need passports to travel.”
On a recent Monday, 17 pregnant or lactating women with H.I.V. went to the center for H.I.V. medication to prevent the transmission of the virus to their babies, but the workers who usually managed the program were not there to provide the medication, Ms. Odera said.
Ms. Odera, who is H.I.V. positive, is afraid that Kenyans will lose access to H.I.V. medications that the United States has historically helped to pay for and deliver. “I am drained thinking about what will happen to my children if I can’t get my medication,” she said.
Nigeria: Childhood malnutrition
After the Trump administration issued its stop-work order, an international nonprofit whose work was partly supported by U.S.A.I.D. began running out of ready-to-use therapeutic food for severely malnourished children in three states, according to a senior humanitarian coordinator at the U.S.-based organization.
For weeks, the official said, the food sat in a warehouse that was waiting for permission from Washington to reopen its doors. Once that permission came through, staff members who would normally distribute the food were unavailable because their employer did not have the funding or permission to let them work.
Even as these problems get resolved, larger disruptions to the pipeline that supplies this lifesaving food may persist and prevent enough from reaching the area, the official said. “Our teams have requested funding to purchase the food locally to meet the demand. They are anticipating very high needs this summer, and they are concerned the food supply won’t be enough.”
“We are plugging leaks in a system that is a dam that’s about to burst,” the official said. “How do we keep up with this, as the supply chains begin to break?”
Burkina Faso: Human rights
The government’s war against Islamist insurgents has escalated in Burkina Faso, leading to the deaths of tens of thousands of civilians, the displacement of three million people, rampaging militias supported by the government and the forced conscription of government opponents.
The Collective Against Impunity and Stigmatization of Communities provides legal and psychological support for victims, as well as food and financial aid. U.S.A.I.D. funds its monitoring program, which employs some 40 people across the vast country to report on acts of violence and repression, said Daniel Salif Gnienhoun, the group’s permanent secretary. When the funds run out, these workers and their families will lose their source of income but worse, human rights violations will go unreported, he said.
“The human rights will be getting worse and worse,” Mr. Gnienhoun said. “Our rights will be violated, and no voice will be raised denouncing what’s going on in the country,” he said, adding: “The government will have the green light to do whatever they want. They can kill innocent civilians because nothing can be reported.”
Asia
Afghanistan: Education
Classes at the American University of Afghanistan, an online school supported by U.S.A.I.D. and one of the last remaining options for higher education for women in the country, have been suspended since January.
“Last year, when I got accepted to AUAF, I was super happy. It was like something impossible for me that happened — being in an American university and engaged with different kinds of students from all of Afghanistan and different kinds of teachers from the entire world,” said one female student living in Afghanistan.
“At first, when I heard [classes were suspended], I was kind of depressed. I didn’t want to do anything,” she said.
“It’s been a long time that [America] has been supporting Afghanistan, Afghan girls — maybe the students of the entire world. This is a situation where girls should be supported; it’s not like before, when we could go to university. Right now we’re just stuck in the corner of the house. We’re in a cage, and we really need support.”
Indonesia: Health care
U.S.A.I.D. is one of the largest providers of health care aid to Indonesia, especially for maternal and newborn health, H.I.V., tuberculosis and malaria. Some local groups have had to lay off staff members, including more than 100 outreach workers who assist patients seeking H.I.V. treatment.
“A major Indonesian government program to revamp access to primary care is supported in part by a U.S.A.I.D. project focused on maternal and newborn health, which has now been halted. Given Indonesia’s high maternal and infant mortality rates, this setback could significantly impair the country’s efforts to reduce these rates as part of its broader health goals,” said Dr. Marcia Soumokil, director of reproductive health nonprofit Ipas Indonesia.
Cambodia: Human trafficking
The Berlin-based Freedom Collaborative network serves as a clearinghouse of information and an adviser for groups in countries helping people who were forced to work in cyberscam compounds. The F.B.I. said that in 2023, Americans potentially lost $12.5 billion in such scams.
Now, with most all of its funding halted by U.S.A.I.D., the Freedom Collaborative will no longer be able to help local groups, including the main shelter in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, a country that is one of the largest havens of cyberscam operations, said Julia Macher, Freedom Collaborative’s chief executive.
“Even if survivors can get out of the compounds, they have no place to put them,” she said. “They have no place to go, and they have no money to fly back home.” Nor will they be able to afford medical treatment, including for broken limbs: Jumping out of windows is one of the escape methods.
Thailand: Climate change
“We help people across Southeast Asia and South Asia manage their forests and adapt to a changing climate,” explained David Ganz, executive director of RECOFTC, a nonprofit headquartered in Bangkok. “Some U.S.A.I.D.-funded programs had to stop immediately: One of our forest fire management projects in the Mekong River region is now on pause, and we are entering the agricultural burning season and hot summer, which significantly increases the risk of wildfires. The uncertainty of this freeze is preventing us from planning long-term.”
“The Philippines and Bangladesh rely heavily on U.S.A.I.D., especially for humanitarian responses after super-typhoons, droughts, floods and other natural disasters. With the freeze, deforestation and wildlife crime are likely to go up again in the region just when we were making some headway on addressing these threats to biodiversity and ecosystems.”
Latin America and the Caribbean
Colombia: Strengthening civil society
U.S.A.I.D. helped support the organization Fundación Paz y Reconciliación through Tetra Tech ARD, a consulting group.
“In Colombia, there is still an armed conflict — including armed groups and threats from organized crime. These programs sought better prevention of human rights violations through early warnings,” said Laura Bonilla, Fundación Paz y Reconciliación’s deputy director. “If there were threats of forced displacement or the murder of a human rights defender, we could warn people. It’s fundamental to save these people because they’re resisting where armed groups have great influence.”
“Catatumbo is one of the regions where the most coca is planted. So cutting the cooperation between U.S.A.I.D., communities and the state strengthens armed groups.”
“The United States had been a key partner in maintaining stability in the region. So we’re going to see a more destabilized Colombia. It’s not a good idea to leave us alone.”
Guatemala: Preventing violence against women
“You’re going to see the impact in Guatemala and Honduras,” a staffer working in Central America for an international nongovernmental organization said.
“We’re responding to one of the biggest challenges in Central America: violence against women and girls.”
The worker explained: “We provided legal and psychosocial resources to help women earn a living and address justice for them. We gave women cash vouchers to find shelter, but the shelters don’t feed people. The shelters don’t cover the cost of a bus to a city where a judge can hear a woman’s case. Our paralegals are there to accompany them. We know that we are leaving women without any income or support.”
Haiti: Preventing malnutrition
After the aid freeze, Action Against Hunger shut down a program that worked with about 13,000 Haitians to educate families about better nutrition and provided training for pregnant and breastfeeding women, among other services.
Martine Villeneuve, Action Against Hunger’s country director in Haiti, said:
“About half of the population is dependent on humanitarian aid, and the number of people living in food insecurity and facing issues of malnutrition has continued to increase since 2016. So we are close to catastrophe.”
“Half of the country is hungry. Having projects that help to diversify the kind of food that you are buying — including understanding the impact of buying local food that is full of nutrients and comes from the farmer next to you — it’s also a cycle of life that helps to re-establish the country.”
Middle East
Syria: Humanitarian aid
Some 2.6 million people in northeastern Syria depend on 50 nongovernmental organizations, many of them mostly funded by U.S.A.I.D.’s Bureau of Humanitarian Affairs. Hundreds of thousands of those people are in shelters, emergency “collection centers” and camps for displaced people, including two holding tens of thousands of family members of suspected ISIS militants.
“We are seeing complete destruction of what once was a humanitarian response. That will not only have direct human implications but a destabilizing security impact across the region,” said a senior official coordinating the humanitarian response in northeast Syria. “Even non-U.S.-funded efforts will effectively be shut down,” the official added. “It’s impossible to deliver an education or protection program where food, fuel and water is not being delivered.”
U.S.A.I.D.-funded health care serves 1.65 million people in the area, the official said. Those services have been drastically cut. How many will die? “We can’t see them. They’re not even making it to a health care center,” the official said.
Europe
Ukraine: Children’s welfare
“An estimated 1.6 million Ukrainian children remain at risk of forced deportation, indoctrination, militarization and identity erasure under Russian occupation,” said Darya Kasyanova, head of the board of the Ukrainian Child Rights Network. “The occupation authorities are systematically forcing Ukrainian children into Russian schools, military training camps and programs designed to erase their national identity and prepare them to become a part of Russian armed forces.”
“Our project was designed to provide these children and their caregivers with vital information on how to recognize these dangers and where to seek help. People in temporarily occupied territories live in an extremely restricted information space and often do not even know that rescue services exist or where to turn for help.”
“The suspension of U.S.A.I.D. funding has severely impacted both the Ukrainian Child Rights Network and our 40 member organizations.”
“Without immediate action, more children will be permanently separated from their families and integrated into Russian-controlled structures, violating their fundamental rights and Ukraine’s future.”
Moldova: Supporting independent media
“Right now, we have everyone’s salaries covered for the next two months, but there’s no predictability after that. Most independent media in Moldova is supported by grants,” Anastasia Condruc, editor in chief of Moldova.org, an independent media organization, said. “The state funds a public TV channel and radio broadcaster. If Moldova.org can’t produce more journalism, I think many vulnerable voices will remain unheard, especially victims of domestic violence or sexual harassment.
Many projects in road-building, business, agriculture and education in Moldova have been paused, and hopes are not high that the funds will return, honestly. It’s hard to estimate the damage done, especially in the long term. We’re afraid the void left by the U.S. might be filled by Russia. We see local pro-Russian politicians celebrating the funding freeze.”
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