On Wednesday, protesters led by Democratic lawmakers and nonprofit workers demonstrated in Washington, D.C., in reply to the Donald Trump administration’s decision to suspend nearly all the employees at the United States Agency for International Development. The USAID website announced all personnel will be placed on administrative leave globally with exception to those working in mission-critical functions.
Additionally, this directive comes following Elon Musk said he is in the process of closing down USAID with the support of President Donald Trump. Musk said, “USAID is a ball of worms,” Musk, the leader of DOGE. There is no apple. And when there is no apple, you’ve just got to basically get rid of the whole thing.”
A present USAID employee who spoke to NPR on the condition of anonymity over fear of being fired attended the rally and stated they’ve been locked out of their work email, phones and timecard software for days. The employee wasn’t sure whether USAID workers will receive pay while on administrative leave since the timecard system is how they get paid. The next scheduled pay day is next week.
The USAID employee also worried about the work that’s been stopped around the world. They said, “We are not in the fight against Ebola”. “It’s only a matter of time before Ebola breaks out of Uganda because USAID is not there”. During the rally, those gathered at the Upper Senate Park along Constitution and Delaware avenues — chanted ‘Elon Musk has got to go’ and held signs that said ‘USAID SAVES LIVES!!!’
Lenore Flower from Greenbelt, Md., states her friends are impacted by the shuttering of USAID and that they are afraid. Flower said, “I’m here to support the many, many people who are in a position where they can’t advocate because their jobs are in danger and all they can do is hold on to their positions. And at the moment, our democracy is in crisis. I’m here to fight back as best I can.”
Family of aid workers also attended, like Linda McCoy of Washington, D.C. “We have a daughter-in-law who’s living in Nairobi doing good work in hunger, but she’s waiting to have the plug pulled on her job any minute because she works very closely with USAID people.”
At the rally, McCoy and others at the rally said Democrats weren’t doing enough to oppose Musk and Trump. She said, “The guardrails don’t seem to be holding,” she said. “And the courts take too long and they’re not shutting down the Senate. Democrats aren’t shutting down the Senate, which they should do.”
Democratic lawmakers criticized the Trump administration at the rally. On Monday, Rubio stated that he is the acting USAID director, and there are certain things that USAID does that we should continue to do and we will continue to do. But everything they do has to be in alignment with the national interest and the foreign policy of the United States. Additionally, USAID was established in 1961 when Congress passed the ‘Foreign Assistance Act’ and President John F. Kennedy signed an executive order. Congress made the agency independent by law in 1998. USAID managed more than $40 billion in 2023 in federal spending on humanitarian and development assistance in more than 100 countries.
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