The agency was a key player in renewable energy and disaster protection around the world — until Elon Musk showed up.
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As part of a broad effort to bypass Congress and unilaterally cut government spending, Donald Trump’s administration has all but shut down operations at the U.S. Agency for International Development, or USAID, the independent federal body that delivers humanitarian aid and economic development funding around the world. On his first day in office, President Trump issued an executive order pausing all USAID funding, and the agency subsequently issued a stop-work order to nearly all funding recipients, from soup kitchens in Sudan to the global humanitarian group Mercy Corps.
Since then, Elon Musk’s new Department of Government Efficiency has shut down the agency’s website, locked employees out of their email accounts, and closed the agency’s Washington office.
