Trump administration says it's cutting 90% of USAID foreign aid contracts

Demonstrators protest against cuts to American foreign aid spending, including USAID and the PEPFAR program to combat HIV/AIDS, at the Cannon House Office Building on Capitol Hill, Wednesday, Feb. 26, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein)

The Trump administration said Wednesday it is eliminating more than 90 per cent of the U.S. Agency for International Development’s foreign aid contracts and $60 billion in overall U.S. assistance around the world.

The cuts detailed by the administration would leave few surviving USAID projects for advocates to try to save in what are ongoing court battles with the administration.

The Trump administration outlined its plans in both an internal memo obtained by The Associated Press and filings in one of those federal lawsuits Wednesday.

Wednesday’s disclosures also give an idea of the scale of the administration’s retreat from U.S. aid and development assistance overseas, and from decades of U.S. policy that foreign aid helps U.S. interests by stabilizing other countries and economies and building alliances.

U.S. President Donald Trump and ally Elon Musk have hit foreign aid harder and faster than almost any other target in their push to cut the size of the federal government. Both men say USAID projects advance a liberal agenda and are a waste of money.

Trump on Jan. 20 ordered what he said would be a 90-day program-by-program review of which foreign assistance programs deserved to continue, and cut off all foreign assistance funds almost overnight. The funding freeze has stopped thousands of U.S.-funded programs abroad, as the administration and Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency teams have pulled the majority of USAID staff off the job through forced leave and firings.

In the federal court filings Wednesday, nonprofits owed money on contracts with USAID describe both Trump political appointees and members of Musk’s teams terminating USAID’s contracts around the world at breakneck speed, without time for any meaningful review, they say.

“‘There are MANY more terminations coming, so please gear up!‘’' lawyers for the nonprofits wrote, quoting an email sent by a USAID official to staff on Monday.

The State Department said Secretary of State Marco Rubio had reviewed the terminations.

In all, the Trump administration said it will eliminate 5,800 of 6,200 multiyear USAID contract awards, for a cut of $54 billion. Another 4,100 of 9,100 State Department grants were being eliminated, for a cut of $4.4 billion.

The Washington Free Beacon was the first to report on the memo.

The memo described the administration as spurred by a federal court order that gave officials until the end of the day Wednesday to lift the Trump administration’s monthlong block on foreign aid funding.

“In response, State and USAID moved rapidly,” targeting USAID and State Department foreign aid programs in vast numbers for contract terminations, the memo said.

The nonprofits, among thousands of contractors, owed billions of dollars in payment since the freeze began, call the en masse contract terminations a maneuver to get around complying with the order to lift the funding freeze temporarily.

Trump administration officials — after repeated warnings from the federal judge in the case — also said Wednesday they had finally begun paying USAID bills again after the monthlong halt on payments, freeing for delivery a few million of billions of dollars owed.

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Ellen Knickmeyer And Matthew Lee, The Associated Press