When USAID contract officers on Monday emailed agency higher-ups asking for the required authorization and justification needed to cancel USAID programs abroad, a lieutenant of Musk responded to the email, one of the contract workers said in one of the sworn accounts filed with the federal court.
In an affidavit ahead the hearing that was scheduled Wednesday, Marocco, a returning USAID political appointee from Trump's first term, presents without evidence a description of agency workers stalling and resisting the administration’s orders to abruptly cut off funds for programs worldwide and subject each one to a rigorous review.
Newly filed affidavits of U.S. Agency for International Development workers describe a lieutenant of Trump ally Elon Musk and other outsiders directing the immediate termination of hundreds of U.S. aid and foreign assistance programs abroad this week, without required documentation or justification.
The Trump administration in its own filings in the case made clear it would present an unforgiving argument for dismantling USAID: The more than 60-year-old aid and development agency is rife with “insubordination" and must be shut down for the Republican administration to decide what pieces of it to salvage.
In the face of “deceit,” “noncompliance” and “insubordination,” USAID’s new leaders “ultimately determined that the placement of a substantial number of USAID personnel on paid administrative leave was the only way to … faithfully implement the pause and conduct a full and unimpeded audit of USAID’s operations and programs,” Marocco stated.
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