USAIDThe United States Agency for International Development will merge into the State Department with significant cuts in the workforce, but will continue to be an entity of humanitarian aid, three US officials said to CBS News.
Officials in the administration of President Trump are expected to announce the movements in the next few days. Discussions on the scope of fund reductions remained fluid on Monday.
Mr. Trump made Secretary of State Marco Rubio the interim administrator of USAID, the sources said. ABC News He previously reported his chief status.
USAID supervises humanitarian, development and security programs in about 120 countries around the world. According to the non -partisan Congress Research ServiceUSAID “provides assistance to strategically important countries and countries; leads to the efforts of the United States to relieve poverty, disease and humanitarian need; and help the commercial interests of the United States in supporting the economic growth of the economic growth of developing countries “.
Foreign aid in general, of which USAID is a part, represents Less than 1% of the federal budget.
Trump said Sunday that the agency was “directed by a lot of radical lunatics. And we are taking them out.”
The USAID headquarters closed on Monday due to a security incident, the sources said, but the incident arose from the efforts during the weekend by the staff of the Efficiency Department of the Government of Elon Musk, known as Doge, to access to USAID systems.
The sources told CBS News that it was related to the USAID Cabinet Chief Matt Hopson, a recent designate from Trump, who tried to prevent Doge officials from getting access to USAID systems. Two senior security officials They were fired on Monday for trying to block access to Doge, according to multiple sources. Hopson resigned on Sunday.
Musk, the Trump administration billionaire advisor, had said he had spoken in detail about Usaid with Mr. Trump. “He agreed that we should close it,” Musk said in a live session late at night on his social media platform X.
Not all the main advisors of Mr. Trump agreed with the idea of closing the agency completely, several sources said.
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