News: Judge gives White House deadline of Wednesday night to pay foreign aid funds

PHOTO CAPTION: A USAID flag flutters outside, as the USAID building sits closed to employees after a memo was issued advising agency personnel to work remotely, in Washington, D.C., U.S., February 3, 2025. REUTERS/Kent Nishimura

By Brendan Pierson

(Reuters) -     A federal judge in Washington on Tuesday ordered the Trump administration to pay foreign aid funds to contractors and grant recipients by 11:59 p.m. on Wednesday night, saying there was no sign that it had taken any steps to comply with his earlier order that the administration's freeze on the funds be lifted.

U.S. District Judge Amir Ali's latest order came in a telephone hearing in a lawsuit brought by organizations that contract with and receive aid from the U.S. Agency for International Development and the State Department. It applies to work done before February 13, when the judge issued his earlier temporary restraining order.

Despite that order, the organizations, which include international development company DAI Global and refugee assistance organization HIAS, say they have not been paid.

Ali on Tuesday pressed a lawyer for the government, Indraneel Sur, on whether the administration had taken any steps to comply with the order. Sur was not able to point to any.

The White House and the State Department did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Tuesday marked the third time Ali, who was appointed by Trump's Democratic predecessor Joe Biden, has ordered the administration officials to release foreign aid funds that were frozen after Republican President Donald Trump ordered a 90-day pause on all foreign aid.

That order, and ensuing stop work orders halting USAID operations around the world, have jeopardized the delivery of life-saving food and medical aid, throwing global humanitarian relief efforts into chaos.

Several plaintiffs have said they will have to shut down completely if they are not paid soon. They allege that the administration has violated federal law and the U.S. Constitution by refusing to pay out the funds and by largely dismantling USAID, which was established as an independent agency by Congress in 1998.

USAID on Sunday said that all of its staff except certain essential workers would be put on paid administrative leave, and that 1,600 positions in the United States would be eliminated.

The foreign aid agency was the first high-profile target of the effort to slash the federal government led by billionaire Elon Musk, who has claimed without evidence that it was plagued by fraud.     

The administration said in court filings last week that it was complying with Ali's order to lift the spending freeze, arguing that it still had room to suspend contracts or grants while it reviews them, or to cancel them for policy reasons.

Ali in an order last week said that the administration could not simply keep the freeze in place by claiming new legal justifications for it. At the time, he denied a motion by two plaintiffs to hold the administration in contempt of court.

 (Reporting By Brendan Pierson in New York, Editing by Deepa Babington, Alexia Garamfalvi and Alistair Bell)