The Domino Effect of DOGE Dismantling USAID

Foreign Aid Orgs Scramble as Government Moves to Completely Shut Down USAID

African Women Rising provides resources and educational opportunities for refugees rebuilding their lives in Northern Uganda. | Credit: Brian Hodges Photography

The Trump Administration’s dismantling of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) took another step on Friday, as the State Department announced it would be shutting down the foreign aid agency completely, informing congress that the State Department would “seek to retire USAID’s independent operation” and take over functions itself — a move that would require eliminating all statutory positions within USAID.

This transition, according to the State Department memo, would occur sometime before July 1, compounding the struggles for humanitarian organizations and nonprofits that are already feeling the effects of the foreign aid funding freeze implemented by the Trump Administration and the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) back in January.

Linda Cole, a Santa Barbara resident and founder of African Women Rising, a nonprofit that helps refugees rebuild their lives in war-torn Northern Uganda, just returned from a trip overseas where she saw firsthand the impacts of foreign aid being slashed.

She explained that, while her organization is funded mostly through donations and does not receive any funding directly from USAID, much of the work is done alongside larger organizations who rely heavily on USAID funds. Many of these organizations, she said, have already lost funding, fired employees, and left a giant gap in resources for more than a million refugees that have moved into camps in Northern Uganda.

In the Palabek Refugee Settlement, for example, each registered refugee relies on a monthly ration of grains, beans, oil, and salt from the USAID-funded World Food Program (WFP). Since this is typically not enough to subsist on for an entire month, organizations like African Women Rising teach refugees how to grow food on their own plots of land to sustain their families or create additional income.

But with USAID funding being cut, programs are already being pulled from refugee camps and grocery deliveries are being reduced each month. WFP packages used to account for nearly 60 percent of an individual’s monthly needs, whereas now the packages are only about 22 percent of what a person actually needs for a month. This has caused an additional strain on smaller organizations like African Women Rising, who have been forced to fill an increasingly larger gap in resources.

“We’re feeling the impact of the dismantling of USAID,” Cole said. “While not directly with our funding, we’re seeing that the World Food Program has lost an enormous amount of their funding.”

Even if funding were to be cut temporarily, and even with courts ordering the Trump Administration to release frozen funds, Cole says that the damage on the ground could be irreversible. “Funding that is being cut is far more than can be replenished,” she said. “So what is happening right now is that people are being fired and programs are being shut down. That has already started, and once you cut it, it’s gone.”

Cole said the loss of employees will also lead to more food shortages, as packages of food continue to sit in harbors without any infrastructure left to deliver them. “There’s no staff to make the payments, and nobody left to drive the trucks,” she said.

“It’s a disaster,” she continued. “We are going to see far more hunger and malnutrition in these camps. I don’t know what to do. I mean, we’re trying to increase the amount of work that we’re doing, but at the same time, if they cut off funding even for six months and reinstate it, that could be death for some people.”

She said that she understood the idea behind wanting to make programs more efficient and getting rid of corruption in government, but said the methods being used by DOGE and the Trump Administration seemed to be too aggressive.

“I think USAID is doing some amazing work, and just like many other government departments, it needs reform,” Cole said. “But what is happening right now, that’s not really reform, it’s completely dismantling. It is such a mess, and there’s so much uncertainty.”

Cole said this all came as a surprise for the thousands who had worked in foreign aid. “It just happened,” she said. “No one ever thought USAID would be on the chopping block. And that’s what’s so difficult about it. They’ve all been fired, and the immediate impact of that is disastrous.”

The decision to shut down USAID will face multiple legal challenges, but those who work in foreign aid worry that the time it will take for cases to move through the courts will force more shortfalls in food, healthcare, disease prevention, education, and financial resources for the world’s most vulnerable communities. Cole says this will no doubt change the way the world views the United States.

“Someone is going to take the place of USAID, and it could be China,” Cole said. “That’s a decision that America has to make. Who do we want to be in the world? Do we want to help only when it benefits us? What kind of influence do we want?”

She said she hopes people understand the true consequences of cutting foreign aid, and wanted to make it clear that the people who get into humanitarian work are “decent, dedicated people who are trying to make a difference.”

“I think it’s shameful the way that people within USAID have been cheated,” Cole said. “I understand that many want to see reform, and I agree. But this is not the way. And if people could see all of the good that is coming out, the difference that is making in the world, and the impact that it has on people’s perceptions of America, I don’t think people would have cut it.”