A court filing showed late Thursday that a federal judge ordered the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump to reinstate funding for hundreds of foreign aid contractors who claimed they were adversely affected by a 90-day blanket freeze.
The order prevents the Trump administration from terminating foreign aid contracts and awards established prior to his taking office on January 20, albeit only temporarily.
This was the first ruling of its kind that overturned Trump’s funding freeze on foreign aid. The lawsuit, brought by two health organizations that receive U.S. funding for overseas programs, resulted in the ruling.
Trump has made efforts to dismantle government agencies, such as the U.S. Agency for International Development, as part of a significant governmental restructuring and has assigned cost-reduction tasks to his billionaire ally Elon Musk.
In a filing in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, U.S. District Judge Amir Ali noted that the proclaimed aim of halting all foreign aid was to allow for an evaluation of programs to determine their effectiveness and alignment with priorities.
Trump has additionally instructed agencies to ready themselves for extensive job reductions, and a number of them have commenced layoffs of recent hires who do not have full job security.
In his initial efforts to reduce the size of the bureaucracy and place more loyalists in positions of power, the Republican has dismissed and removed from view hundreds of civil servants and high-ranking officials at various agencies.
