The agency’s work should align with the “national interest and foreign policy” of the US, the secretary of state has said
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced on Monday that he has assumed the role of acting administrator of the US Agency for International Development (USAID), Washington's primary agency for funding political projects abroad.
On Monday, USAID also reportedly closed its main office in Washington, DC, and told personnel to stay away. Last week, Trump halted all of the agency's programs for 90 days pending case-by-case reviews.
“I’m the acting director of USAID,” the top US diplomat told journalists on a visit to El Salvador, his first foreign trip since taking up office. He also said he had handed over day-to-day duties of running the agency to a staffer but did not identify that person.
President Donald Trump has accused the agency’s leadership of being “radical lunatics” and has proposed major changes to the organization. USAID also found itself under scrutiny by the newly created Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) led by tech billionaire Elon Musk, who has become a close advisor to Trump.
“This is not about ending the programs that USAID does, per se,” Rubio stated, referring to the billions of dollars and thousands of 'projects' the agency has funded. Some, he claimed, were “good” but others raised “strong questions.”
“Everything” that USAID does “has to be in alignment with the national interest and the foreign policy of the United States,” Rubio insisted. A program-by-program review will be carried out to determine which make “America safer, stronger or more prosperous.”
According to Rubio, the move led to “a lot more cooperation” from the recipients of US assistance.
Musk has claimed that President Trump had “agreed” to shut down the agency, which handed out over $60 billion in 2023 alone, entirely. The president branded it a “criminal organization” that he believes was financing bioweapons research, including projects that allegedly led to the emergence of Covid-19.
The agency’s website went dark and its account on the social media platform X, which is owned by Musk, disappeared over the weekend.
