A 90-day suspension and stop-work order on most U.S. foreign aid has snagged some antihunger and agricultural development efforts while stalling shipment of agricultural commodities, according to lawmakers and aid groups.
There has been considerable confusion among aid organizations and farm groups surrounding the pause in funding associated with the Trump administration’s effort to downgrade the U.S. Agency for International Development and move its operations to the State Department.
Distribution of emergency food assistance is still permitted under a waiver granted by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, but a considerable amount of U.S. food commodities intended for non-emergency purposes is caught in the aid suspension, and coordination on emergency shipments has been hampered as well, outside experts and aid workers say.
Rubio characterizes USAID as a rogue agency that was improperly acting as a global charity. He said Tuesday there was no reason for confusion about what kind of assistance is exempt from the aid suspension.
"I issued a blanket waiver that said, if this is life-saving programs, okay, if it's providing food or medicine or anything that is saving lives and is immediate and urgent, you're not included in the freeze," Rubio said.
But Sen. Jerry Moran, R-Kan., said in a post on X Monday evening that $340 million worth of food aid is stuck in ports because of the suspension.
The top Democrat on the House Agriculture Committee, Angie Craig of Minnesota, raised similar concerns.
“U.S.-run international food assistance programs provide critical business for American farmers and the entire agricultural supply chain,” Craig said. There are currently over 550 million metric tons of food — worth over $340 million — that were expected to be provided by America’s farmers that are now either in limbo or stuck at U.S. export ports, unable to be delivered.
“The uncertainty caused by Elon Musk’s attacks on USAID hurts the rural economy and damages the proud heritage of American farmers feeding the world," her statement said.
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Tuesday night, a message on the USAID website said “all USAID direct hire personnel will be placed on administrative leave globally, with the exception of designated personnel responsible for mission-critical functions, core leadership and specially designated programs.”
Even before that, the turmoil at USAID was affecting food aid, according to a source familiar with the situation. "Most of USAID’s staff is not working, including technical experts responsible for managing procurement and supply chains," the source said in an email.
Management of Food for Peace commodities "has become more complicated, and the inability to coordinate with USAID on procurement, shipping, and programming has created significant challenges. A substantial amount of U.S. food aid is currently on hold, either domestically, on ships, or in warehouses."
Soy products, malnutrition treatment stalled by freeze
The freeze also has forced companies and organizations to stop the production of therapeutic foods and other products, including corn-soy blends that are used in feeding programs in poor countries, said Gena Perry, executive director of the World Initiative for Soy in Human Health, a program operated by the American Soybean Association.
Gena PerryShe said there is considerable confusion among organizations over what types of food assistance could be eligible for a State Department waiver.
Perry said at least 330,000 metric tons of soy products have been affected by the aid freeze.
The aid suspension also affects nonemergency programs such as the provision of seeds to farmers and malnutrition treatments for young children, according to a newly furloughed nutrition adviser at USAID who spoke to Agri-Pulse and other media outlets on condition of anonymity.
“I think of like the farmers who should be planting their fields right now, and in three months when they should be harvesting. They're not going to have money to feed their family,” said the former adviser, who worked for one of several contractors who supply much of USAID’s workforce.
She said the impact of the aid suspension on farmer assistance will vary depending on the country and season. In Liberia, “we were just about to purchase our seeds to hand out [to farmers]. This is prime planting season."
The adviser also said malnutrition treatment for young children can’t be delivered where it’s needed and is at risk of spoilage as a result of the suspension.
An employee with a major nonprofit aid organization that implements USAID programs said the suspension has forced groups to stop all their work.
“It's obviously devastating to our colleagues who are out in these communities and have been working there for a long time, to have to just stop in the middle of the programs that they're doing. And then obviously it's just really devastating for the communities that we're serving,” she said.
She said USAID programs provide “American-grown food that's feeding millions of people around the world” and employ “American innovation to … train smallholder farmers to build up their own local food systems and improve local agricultural markets and global health.”
In Sudan, Javid Abdelmoneim, a physician with Doctors Without Borders, told CNN that several organizations have said in recent days they can no longer provide food or medicine because of the aid freeze.
Rubio blames aid groups for waiver confusion
The State Department press office didn’t respond Tuesday to a request for comment on the reported delays in food deliveries and other aid. The Trump administration has taken down USAID’s website, and the agency’s offices were closed on Monday and Tuesday.
Secretary of State Marco RubioRubio on Tuesday sought to blame aid groups for the confusion about what’s included in the freeze.
"I would say if some organization is receiving funds from the United States and does not know how to apply a waiver, then I have real questions about the competence of that organization, or I wonder whether they're deliberately sabotaging it for purposes of making a political point,” he said.
But Jeremy Konyndyk, president of Refugees International, said in a post on X that the problem with the waiver process is that the exemptions must be requested by USAID personnel, who have now been purged as part of the downsizing of the agency.
President Donald Trump designated Rubio as acting administrator of USAID on Monday.
"One of the most common complaints you will get if you go to embassies around the world from State Department officials and ambassadors and the like is USAID is not only not cooperative," Rubio said in the Fox News interview. "They undermine the work that we’re doing in that country. They are supporting programs that upset the host government for whom we’re trying to work with on a broader scale, and so forth."
House Ag Committee Chair Glenn "GT" Thompson told Agri-Pulse "it made perfect sense" Rubio would serve as acting director of USAID as the agency was being reviewed. "I can't think of anyone to help straighten that out any quicker than Secretary Rubio," Thompson added.
Musk calls USAID 'scam,' boasts of putting agency to 'wood chipper'
Billionaire Elon Musk, who is leading Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency, attacked USAID and its staff repeatedly in posts on X. He has described USAID as a criminal organization and called it a “scam” and “radical-left political psy-op.” He boasted that he “spent the weekend feeding USAID into the wood chipper."
Musk asserted that his staff focused on USAID after determining it was violating Trump’s executive orders more than any other agency.
Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, said the agency did not cooperate with her investigations of its spending. She told Fox News its personnel “only allowed us access to a small amount of data, but what we found was extreme expenditures on the part of USAID with very little data-driven results.”
Ernst told reporters Monday she has “a laundry list of years' worth of frustrations with USAID and their efforts to block me from looking at contracts.”
Democrats complained about the chaos that has surrounded the aid freeze and accused Musk and Trump of illegally trying to dismantle USAID in order to find money to pay for tax cuts.
"We’re trying to figure out what's frozen [and] what's not," Rep. Jim McGovern, D-Mass., told Agri-Pulse outside the agency headquarters Monday. McGovern and several Democrats went to the agency to protest the administration actions.
Rep. McGovern speaks at a press conference in front of the USAID headquarters with other Democratic members of Congress Monday before going into the agency. (Photo: Lydia Johnson) Dismantling USAID "is illegal and undermines our national security," the Democratic minority on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee posted on X Tuesday. "Those serving their country at home have been disrespected and those working overseas have been put in harm's way."
USAID shares food aid programs with the Department of Agriculture. In general, USDA procures commodities to be distributed by other organizations, including the UN World Food Program.
USAID also provides emergency cash assistance in areas experiencing food crises along with an early-warning system for famines online database — abbreviated as FEWS NET — that distributes information to decision-makers, allowing them to authorize timely measures to prevent food-insecure conditions. The FEWS NET website, FEWS NET learning platform and the FEWS NET data warehouse and data explorer "are currently unavailable," according to an error message displayed on the website that previously held the information.
One of its major development programs is the Feed the Future initiative to improve farm practices and increase food production in very poor countries. It has been required to stop work indefinitely.
According to the Congressional Research Service, Trump cannot legally abolish USAID. It was created by executive order in 1961 but became an independent agency through congressional legislation in 1998.
“Because Congress established USAID as an independent establishment . . . within the executive branch, the President does not have the authority to abolish it; congressional authorization would be required to abolish, move, or consolidate USAID,” says a CRS report.
According to CRS, USAID spent $43.4 billion in fiscal 2023, including $10.5 billion on humanitarian assistance and $1.3 billion on agricultural development.
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