On the U.S. Company for Worldwide Growth this week, as a staff from the Department of Government Efficiency quietly labored to dismantle the help company, those that hadn’t already been locked out of its Washington headquarters busied themselves with work they by no means imagined doing — shutting it down.
“We really feel prefer it’s closing time on the retailer and we are the ones left to show off the lights,” one profession official informed ABC Information. “There’s plenty of tears, plenty of heartbreak.”
Regular day-to-day work ceased earlier within the week, when the Trump administration introduced plans to place all direct-hire employees on leave beginning Friday, leaving profession officers to give attention to the logistical hurdles of recalling hundreds of abroad staff again to the U.S., together with reserving flights for these officers and their households.
“We might be doing the lifesaving work we have been doing,” the official mentioned, “however as a substitute we’re caught right here like journey brokers.”
Late Friday, a federal choose mentioned he plans to temporarily block the Trump administration from putting remaining staff on go away, casting much more uncertainty on the fortunes of some 2,200 USAID employees.
As congressional Democrats scramble to rescue USAID, its hundreds of staff within the U.S. and across the globe are grappling with the way to “go away with dignity,” one other profession company official mentioned.
However doing so has confirmed to be a problem. A message posted on USAID.gov signaled that some “designated personnel” would stay on the job, prompting a frantic race amongst employees to safe their livelihoods.
Black plastic covers the house the place the letters of USAID had been mounted on the constructing on the US Company for Worldwide Growth (USAID) headquarters in Washington, D.C., on Feb. 7, 2025.
Alex Wroblewski/EPA by way of Shutterstock
“It is the Starvation Video games,” one other profession USAID official based mostly in Washington mentioned. “They’re narrowing down lists to the smallest variety of employees. Individuals combating to be on these lists.”
USAID employees on Thursday had been digesting information that each one however roughly 600 staff can be positioned on go away by the tip of the week. President Trump has accused the company of perpetrating “great fraud” and selling left-wing ideologies.
In the meantime, officers deployed abroad face hurdles of their very own. The abrupt stop-work orders and funding freezes imposed by the Trump administration have positioned frontline USAID staff within the uncomfortable place of explaining to regional companions what is going on.
“A lot of [the foreign service nationals] have labored for USAID for 20-30 years,” mentioned one USAID official stationed within the Democratic Republic of Congo. “It is unattainable to elucidate to them what’s going on. It breaks their religion in America. We’re going to lose hundreds of our greatest mates and allies.”
In a unique African nation, employees met earlier within the week to start choreographing their departure, an area USAID official recalled.
“The assembly as we speak with native employees was tough,” the official mentioned. “The ambassador was there, and folk had been crying. It was extraordinarily unhappy. Each the mission director and the deputy mission director had been additionally in tears.”
A employee removes the U.S. Company for Worldwide Growth signal on their headquarters on Feb. 7, 2025, in Washington.
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One official with 20 years at USAID underneath their belt mentioned the ambassador of their nation inspired employees to “begin making ready your CVs and begin on the lookout for jobs, as a result of inevitably, you are all going to be terminated.”
“[The administration is] simply terrorizing everybody in USAID who has served their nation, making large sacrifices, shifting all over the world each 4 years, pulling children out of faculty and away from mates and like spouses giving up their very own careers in order that we will serve our nation and do that necessary work all over the world,” the official mentioned. “And I really feel like It is being erased.”
On the company’s Bureau for Humanitarian Help, which has been the U.S. authorities’s lead response coordinator for worldwide disasters, a number of staff mentioned their e mail entry was revoked, rendering them unable to speak with senior officers.
One USAID contractor abroad mentioned they had been “caught overseas on official journey with no steerage on the way to proceed, the place they’re able to work, the way to get dwelling, or whether or not they’re able to work.”
The partner of a present USAID official within the Latin America area informed ABC Information that their household doesn’t have a house to return to within the U.S.
“My partner has served in a warfare zone. We’ve school-age youngsters with typical challenges you’ll face within the U.S. — however not with the assets you’ll have within the U.S. — that we have needed to handle, and we have been keen to maneuver wherever is finest for the company,” the official mentioned. “We wouldn’t have a house to return to, which is sort of typical of International Service households, and we do not understand how we’re supposed to choose up and simply go away.”
A USAID official based mostly in Asia informed ABC Information that she’s pregnant and is apprehensive that the administration goes to desert her abroad.
“I’m amongst greater than a dozen American households which can be both on or planning obstetric medevac to ship our infants,” she mentioned. “We’ve been informed there isn’t any cash to help USAID households which can be awaiting the arrival of our infants with resettlement within the U.S. We’ve been utilizing refugee assets from our church buildings and group teams that we normally use to assist refugees from locations like Syria and Afghanistan.”
“Except the tide of public opinion shifts,” the official mentioned, “every of those households are going to reach homeless, jobless, and insurance-less inside a matter of days, or presumably even hours, of stepping foot on American soil.”
On Thursday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who’s overseeing USAID as its performing administrator, insisted throughout a press convention within the Dominican Republic that the administration would accommodate “distinctive circumstances concerning households or displacement.”
Federal staff and supporters maintain indicators as they display in opposition to Elon Musk and his Division of Authorities Effectivity (DOGE) outdoors of the Workplace of Personnel Administration (OPM) headquarters in Washington, DC, Feb. 07, 2025.
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“We’re not making an attempt to be disruptive to peoples’ private lives,” Rubio insisted. “We’re not being punitive,” he mentioned.
Again in Washington, Peter Marocco, a Trump loyalist and the architect of plans to drastically diminish the company’s footprint, has been “out and in” of the constructing, however has not engaged with profession officers or addressed any giant numbers of employees. Marocco didn’t reply to ABC Information’ request for remark.
Rubio has mentioned rank-and-file USAID officers had demonstrated “rank insubordination” throughout makes an attempt to overtake the company, claiming that the administration was left with “no alternative however to take dramatic steps to deliver this factor underneath management.”
Late Thursday, as working hours on the East Coast wound down, a senior profession official at USAID shared this somber textual content message with ABC Information: “I simply misplaced my job.”
The official, who spent practically a decade on the company, was not informed she was dismissed. As a substitute, she mentioned company leaders alerted those that will stay of their roles on Thursday afternoon, leaving the remaining staff to imagine they might be positioned on administrative go away.
