After a month of attacks and beginnings, a final hammer was reduced to the United States Agency for International Development on Wednesday night when the State Department, which had previously said that it was going to review all foreign aid, announced that the review had ended and had decided to terminate almost 10,000 government contracts worth approximately $ 60 million in humanitarian work abroad.
The cancellations left help organizations staggering on Thursday.
Many, for weeks, had advocated the closed doors so that their projects continue and request exemptions to provide immediate help that saves lives while the revision process was underway. Several organizations decided on Thursday to speak, since they face a future with almost all of the United States.
“Any type of communicable disease, I think we will see rampant rage. I think we will see a greater conflict in the world. I think we will see an increase in terrorism in the world. And so, I think that the implications will be really serious in terms of the instability that this creates in very instable regions of the world,” said Jocelyn Wyatt, CEO of Aleight, an international organization that provides foods that provides foods, International organization, the services of the 20, the services of the 20. World.
Like all international aid organizations, four days after the inauguration of President Donald Trump, it was told Alight to suspend all the programs financed through subsidies and contracts in the United States.
Wyatt described the fight to keep the medical care clinics of his organization afloat. They had to close programs in Uganda and Myanmar, but they could ensure exemptions from the State Department for humanitarian aid that saved lives to maintain their operations in Somalia, Sudan and South Sudan.
A woman in a shirt of the International Development Agency (USAID) of the US Agency.
Nathan Howard/Reuters
But until Thursday, all American contracts in Alight have been canceled in the future, including contracts related to those programs that had received exemptions to continue in recent weeks.
Now, Wyatt said that Alight is closing 33 Medical Care Clinics in Sudan, many in areas where they were the only medical care providers, as well as water and disinfection services in three refugee fields in the country and 13 other clinics in Somalia.
According to Wyatt, their clinics see 1,200 people a day alone in Somalia, including about 700 malnourished children a day in designated feeding centers where children are heavy and supplementary foods are provided.
“We cannot provide any service to those severely malnourished children, so it is really a matter of days or weeks before many of them die,” said ABC News during an interview on Thursday. “The toll, the human life that will be lost, is unfathomable.”
On Thursday it seemed to be a decisive moment for humanitarian leaders who, until now, had been reluctant to speak publicly for concern that their organizations could face a violent reaction or see subsidies and contracts suffer.
David Miliband, president and CEO of the International Rescue Committee, described the termination of the contracts “a devastating blow”.
“These are people who depend on the services financed by the United States for the basic survival concepts. These programs are not only numbers on a spreadsheet; they represent real and future real lives,” he wrote in a statement, asking the United States government to reconsider. “The countries affected by these cuts, including Sudan, Yemen, Syria, house millions of innocent civilians who are victims of war and disaster. Now we face the most marked elections of decisions about which services can be protected, and are calling the public, US corporations and philanthropos that show that the generosity of the United States of spirit and commitment to the most vulnerable has not been lost.”
“We are no longer the brilliant city in a hill,” said a humanitarian leader, who requested to speak anonymously for fear of the remuneration of his organization, said ABC News in an interview on Thursday.
“It seems that cruelty is the point. It is not about putting the United States first. This will kill people around the world,” added the leader.
A man holds an American flag near a signage of the Ronald Reagan building after the USED USAID workers cleared their desks and collected personal belongings, during a shipment in Washington, DC, on February 27, 2025.
Nathan Howard/Reuters
While help organizations expected a review of their work with the new administration, the scope and scale of the cuts have been shocking and will mean that many help organizations will be forced to drastically reduce their work or close all.
The termination notices were included in a judicial presentation on Wednesday night, since the leading aid organizations sued the federal government in almost $ 2 billion in past payments, they say that the work already completed during the first part of this year is owed.
The presentation declared that almost 5,800 USAID Awards for future work, and approximately 4,100 distributed through the State Department, will be canceled, while around 500 USAID awards and approximately 2,700 state department awards will be kept.
Alight is generally based on US foreign aid dollars.
Even so, Wyatt said his organization will survive and worry about others who will not do it as well as the impact it will have on the people they serve.
Despite the agitation of recent weeks, he was reluctant to speak publicly because of the concern that his organization, N and the clients they serve, could be affected and with reprisals.
She said that she understands the impulse of the new administration to evaluate the expense of taxpayers and foreign aid and that she was prepared to undergo an evaluation of her organization and ensure that Trump’s first American foreign policy will be aligned.
Ambassador Samantha Power, former head of the United States Agency for International Development, embraces employees and their supporters outside the agency’s headquarters when former workers gathered their personal belongings on February 27, 2025, in Washington, DC.
Somodevilla/Getty chip
But now that all its contracts have been canceled, Wyatt hopes to raise awareness and apply public pressure.
The international medical body, one of the largest disaster relief organizations in the world, wrote in a statement that they received cancellation notices for “the majority of our programs financed by the United States government” on Wednesday night.
“As a result, we are in the process of closing the affected programs. Although we receive funds from a variety of sources, this loss of funds will significantly affect our global operations that save lives. To navigate this challenge, we will need to implement substantial changes throughout the organization in the coming days and weeks,” reads the statement.
The BMI, which works in more than 30 countries and only last year said that they provided direct medical care services to more than 16.5 million people, had received approximately half of their US funds. UU. It also currently manages two of the only field hospitals that are still operational in Gaza.
The global shelter, previously immigration service and Lutheran refugees, wrote in a statement on Thursday that the terminations of the contract did not equal a “simple review of federal resources”, but “seeks to end the former religious tradition of the United States to help at least among us.”
