Senior U.S. foreign assistance official ousted after his memo criticising Musk foreign aid cuts

Senior USAID official ousted as he details problems providing lifesaving aid The memo contradicts claims by Secretary of State Marco Rubio that he has put in place a functioning system for exempting lifesaving assistance from the aid freeze. John Hudson The Washington Post

A senior career official at the U.S. Agency for International Development was placed on leave Sunday on the same day he disseminated a detailed memo to staff describing the U.S. government’s “failure” to provide lifesaving assistance around the world because of actions by President Donald Trump’s political appointees.

The memo, by Nicholas Enrich, the acting assistant administrator for global health, contradicts claims by Secretary of State Marco Rubio that a functioning system is in place for exempting lifesaving assistance from the aid freeze imposed by Trump on his first week in office.

“USAID’s failure to implement lifesaving humanitarian assistance under the waiver is the result of political leadership,” says the memo, obtained by The Washington Post.

“This will no doubt result in preventable death, destabilization, and threats to national security on a massive scale,” the memo says. ...

The broken system for providing waivers has been noted by aid groups for several weeks but never spelled out in such detail in an official government memo. The ouster of Enrich comes as the Trump administration has gutted USAID, placing the vast majority of the 10,000-strong workforce on administrative leave, terminating 90 percent of its foreign aid programs and cutting more than 1,600 jobs.

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