U.S. Agency for International Development employees gathered Monday to mark the humanitarian and development organization's final day as an independent agency. Former Presidents Barack Obama and George W. Bush were among the officials who thanked the outgoing staffers via videoconference, while U2's Bono read a poem he had written about the agency and its gutting by the Trump administration.
Who said what
President John F. Kennedy created USAID in 1961 as a "peaceful way of promoting U.S. national security by boosting goodwill and prosperity abroad," The Associated Press said, and it was "one of the first and most fiercely targeted" agencies uprooted by President Donald Trump and Elon Musk's DOGE operation. Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced in March that the administration had slashed 83% of USAID programs, with the remaining ones to be absorbed into the State Department today.
Monday's farewell event was "billed as a closed-press event to allow political leaders and others privacy for sometimes angry and often teary remarks," said the AP, which viewed parts of the video. Obama told the staffers that dismantling USAID would "go down as a colossal mistake" that "hurts the most vulnerable" in the world and ultimately "hurts the United States."
"Is it in our interest that 25 million people who would have died now live?" said Bush, citing the estimated number of lives saved through his President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief program. "I think it is." Bush's initiative retained "significant funding" after "bipartisan blowback from Congress" to steeper cuts, the AP said. But its "future, like much of U.S. foreign aid, is unclear," The New York Times said. "It's not left-wing rhetoric to feed the hungry, heal the sick," Bono said. "If this isn't murder, I don't know what is."
What next?
A study published in the journal The Lancet Monday estimated that USAID prevented 91 million deaths in 133 countries between 2001 and 2021 and that its dismantling could lead to more than 14 million preventable deaths by 2030, including over 4.5 million young children. The State Department told the AP it would be introducing USAID's successor agency, called America First, this week, ensuring "proper oversight and that every tax dollar spent will help advance our national interests."
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