Supreme Court Rejects Trump Request To Cancel $2B In Foreign Aid
On Wednesday, the Supreme Court in a 5-4 emergency ruling refused to halt a judge’s decision ordering the Trump administration to immediately release nearly $2 billion in foreign aid payments owed under existing contracts.
It hands a loss to the administration in the first time that Trump’s efforts to drastically reshape federal spending, agency by agency, have reached the high court.
Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Amy Coney Barrett joined with the court’s three liberals to side against the administration.
Four of the court’s conservatives — Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh — dissented.
“Does a single district-court judge who likely lacks jurisdiction have the unchecked power to compel the Government of the United States to pay out (and probably lose forever) 2 billion taxpayer dollars? The answer to that question should be an emphatic ‘No,’ but a majority of this Court apparently thinks otherwise. I am stunned,” Alito wrote, joined by the three others.
The Trump administration has broadly sought to dismantle the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), including by firing employees and freezing its payments to contractors, sparking a wave of lawsuits.
The Supreme Court’s emergency decision keeps in place a lower judge’s order enforcing his directive that the administration maintain foreign aid agreements that existed before Trump took office.
This is a breaking news story. Please check back for updates.
