By Jonathan Landay and Humeyra Pamuk
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The Trump administration’s abrupt move to dismantle the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) has upended the lives of thousands of American employees and family members posted overseas, leaving them facing costly and difficult decisions, agency personnel said on Friday.
A U.S. judge on Friday said he would enter a “very limited” temporary order blocking the Trump administration’s changes to the agency, but the fate of its staff remained uncertain.
The employees affected by Trump’s actions include pregnant women whose plans to fly back to the United States to deliver their babies have been disrupted and families who will return home without housing or schooling for their children, they said.
“We literally have focused our life on this USAID mission, and we do not have a home to go back to,” said the spouse of a Latin America-based employee. “We don’t know how we’re supposed to pick up and just leave.”
She joined several agency personnel who spoke during an online briefing arranged by StandUpForAID, a group of current and former officials formed to raise awareness of the impacts of Trump’s cuts to the agency.
All requested anonymity out of fear of retribution for speaking out.
U.S. President Donald Trump froze U.S. foreign assistance after taking office on January 20, stalling billions of dollars in food, health and other programs. The spending freeze is supposed to last 90 days pending a review of efficiencies and consistency with Trump’s foreign policy.
USAID, the chief U.S. humanitarian agency and an employer of more than 10,000 people – including more than 1,900 Americans posted abroad – became the first target of the effort led by billionaire Elon Musk to reduce the size of the U.S. government.
The U.S. Department of State did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
More than one dozen pregnant agency employees and spouses planning to fly home for their deliveries at USAID expense are stranded overseas, said a USAID employee.
“We are unsure if Secretary (of State Marco) Rubio and President Trump are going to abandon us overseas or abandon us when we land on American soil,” she said. “We have been told there is no money to assist U.S. families who are awaiting the arrival of our infants with resettlement in the United States.”
She said that the terms of her husband’s employment called for them to be provided housing for 60 days on their return under an evacuation order or another form of rapid repatriation.
“Our employer, the United States government, is not honoring its duty of care,” she said.
Another pregnant USAID official placed on administrative leave on Friday told Reuters in an interview that she had to scramble to change her delivery location to ensure her State Department-arranged medical evacuation.
The State Department could not guarantee that her medical costs would be covered beyond March 9, the deadline set for the repatriation of all USAID workers overseas, she said, leaving her in deep financial uncertainty.
Reuters could not confirm the exact number of pregnant agency employees and spouses. In a meeting on Wednesday with staff at the U.S. embassy in Guatemala City, Rubio, now the acting USAID administrator, acknowledged there were a number of “members of (US)AID that are in their third trimester of a pregnancy,” and that the recalling of staff might have been disruptive, according to a partial transcript of the remarks reviewed by Reuters.
The administration will keep 611 essential USAID workers, according to a notice sent by the agency late on Thursday night and shared with Reuters by an administration official on Friday.
More than two-thirds of USAID’s personnel work overseas, and originally were told they would have to pack up and fly home by Friday. That directive was replaced by another setting the March 9 deadline.
(Reporting by Jonathan Landay and Humeyra Pamuk; Editing by Don Durfee and Rosalba O’Brien)
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