Thousands gathered at the US Capitol on Wednesday after the shock announcement on Tuesday evening that the US Agency for International Development (USAid) was putting nearly all of its employees on leave and recalling thousands of officers from their postings abroad.
The news came only days after nearly a thousand contractors were laid off or furloughed, the USAid website was taken down, and its X account was deleted.
Protesters gathered near the Capitol under chilly, overcast skies and chanted: “Let us work!” and “USAid! USAid!”
“We are in a very, very dire place,” Jeremy Konyndyk, a top USAid health official under Barack Obama and Joe Biden, told the crowd. “The attempt to kill USAid will kill people.”
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Competitors such as Russia and China were cheering this decision, he added.
His voice rose as he addressed members of Congress in the halls behind him – especially lawmakers, he said, who had supported the agency and its work for years.
A protest in support of USAid on Wednesday in Washington. Photograph: Drew Angerer/AFP/Getty Images
“You know that what is being said about USAid is not true,” Konyndyk said. “Speak up! Where are you?”
“This is a dictatorship in the making,” Ed Markey, a senator from Massachusetts, told the crowd. “This is an example” of what the Trump administration can do to agencies such as the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), he said.
“We are the moral force of the world,” Markey said. “The only way to take back our government is to take to the streets by the millions to demand justice, not just for our country but for people around the world.”
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Nearly all of USAid’s work, which includes preventing HIV and famine as well as rebuilding nations after conflict and improving education, was halted unexpectedly on 24 January for a 90-day review.
Experts say the erasure of the agency is a test run for the Trump administration, which has also put agencies such as the Department of Education and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa) in its crosshairs.
“This is showing that you can do a slash-and-burn to the American governmental apparatus, including foreign aid,” Joia Mukherjee, chief medical officer of the non-profit Partners in Health, told the Guardian.
While USAid has enjoyed bipartisan support in the past, it’s now a target for conservatives. But Mukherjee said that nothing about aid work had changed in Washington.
“I think the fidelity to Trump changed,” she said. Members of Congress are “afraid of Trump”, she added. “This is just a loyalty test.”
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Protesters on Wednesday. Photograph: Drew Angerer/AFP/Getty Images
Pete Marocco, who was allegedly photographed and filmed at the January 6 riots, appeared to threaten aid workers with military action if they didn’t comply with evacuation orders, according to a source at USAid who read the recall letter.
Marocco was named deputy administrator of USAid on Monday by the secretary of state, Marco Rubio. That position needs confirmation by the US Senate before being filled.
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Rubio seized control of the agency to fold it into the state department after alleging that officials at the agency had been too “independent”, Rubio told reporters on Monday.
The aid agency was founded in 1961, but was enshrined into law as an independent agency by Congress in 1998. Only lawmakers have the power to dismantle or move it.
“What’s happening is unconstitutional and illegal,” said Sharon Baker, who worked on grants and contracts for USAid for 11 years before retiring.
“It’s enormous – it affects all Americans,” she said, before adding of USAid staff: “In global emergencies, they’re the first responders. [After earthquakes and tsunamis], they’re the ones who are there first. You see airplanes offloading supplies that say ‘from the American people’.”
A caricature of Trump at the protest. Photograph: Win McNamee/Getty Images
The move to stop work and dissolve the agency into the state department without direction from Congress is unprecedented, said one contractor who worked for USAid for 20 years before being furloughed last week.
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“It puts us and the world in danger in a way it never has before,” said the contractor, who requested anonymity to protect their job.
“I think this is Project 2025 in action. They’re doing what they said they would do.”
The stop-work order is “the most catastrophic thing we’ve seen in foreign aid since we started working on famine in Ethiopia in the 80s”, said Crickett Nicovich, who works for the non-profit Results.
“Congress needs to stand up and defend USAid. Conservatives have told us that they care about these issues for years,” Nicovich said.
“Without them pushing back, this dismantling of programs is costing hundreds of thousands of lives around the world.”
With a blue sky above the Lincoln Memorial, people walk along the reflection pool in Washington, D.C., on June 9, 2023.
Jose Luis Magana/AP
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Jose Luis Magana/AP
A nonprofit is suing the National Park Service, the Department of the Interior and Interior Secretary Doug Burgum over the decision to resurface the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool at Washington D.C.’s National Mall, and to paint the pool’s basin blue.
The suit was filed Monday in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia by The Cultural Landscape Foundation (TCLF), an education and advocacy organization. In the suit, TCLF is asking a federal judge to halt the project, saying that the Trump administration failed to have the project reviewed federally, as is dictated by the National Historic Preservation Act.
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President Trump revealed his plans for the pool do-over last month in “American flag blue,” saying that the project would take one week and $2 million, and that it would be completed in time for the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence on July 4. A few days later on Truth Social, the president posted a fake image of himself and several of his administration officials in swimsuits, along with an unidentified woman in a gingham bikini, lounging in the water with the Washington National Monument at the rear. (Swimming in the reflecting pool is prohibited by federal law.)
In a YouTube video posted by the White House on April 23, Trump called the pool “filthy dirty” and said it “leaked like a sieve.” In that video, Trump said he was going to call three companies that he has worked with in the past – “all they do is swimming pools” – and say, “Give me a good price.”
The New York Times reported last Friday that the contract for the reflecting pool’s resurfacing was awarded in a $6.9 million no-bid contract to a company called Atlantic Industrial Coatings, which previously has never held any federal contracts.
An employee at the Atlantic Industrial Coatings confirmed in a telephone call on Monday that it has been contracted for this project, but referred all other questions to the Department of the Interior.
The Times reported on Monday that the final cost of the project could be upward of $13 million, per documents it says it has obtained. The Department of the Interior did not confirm the cost of the project, but wrote: “The contract price reflects the effort necessary to expedite the timeline of completing the leak prevention coating project—more people, more materials, more equipment and longer hours ahead of our 250th.”
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In an unsigned statement emailed to NPR Monday afternoon, the Interior Department wrote: “The National Park Service chose the best company to expedite the repair of the iconic Reflecting Pool ahead of our 250 celebrations. The choice of American Flag Blue will enhance the visitor experience by making the pool reflect the grand Lincoln Memorial and Washington Monument. NPS is also investing in a state-of-the-art ozone nanobubbler filtration system and will now have a dedicated crew who will maintain the grounds’ from wildlife. The Department is proud of the work being carried out by our Park Service to ensure this magical spot can be enjoyed for not only our 250th, but for many generations to come.”
Critics of the project, including TCLF, don’t share that vision – and are taking particular umbrage at the color.
“The reflecting pool should not be viewed in isolation; it is part of the larger ensemble of designed landscapes that comprise the National Mall,” Charles A. Birnbaum, the president and CEO of TCLF, said in a statement emailed to NPR Monday. “The design intent, to create a reflective surface that is subordinate, is fundamental to the solemn and hallowed visual and spatial connection between the Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial. A blue-tinted basin is more appropriate to a resort or theme park.”
The National Park Service regularly cleans out algae, goose droppings and other detritus from the reflecting pool. The last major renovation of the reflecting pool, which included the installation of a new circulation and filtration system, took place during the Obama administration at a reported cost of $34 million.
Before founding TCLF in 2008, Birnbaum served for 15 years as the coordinator of the Historic Landscape Initiative for the National Park Service.
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TCLF has another open lawsuit against the federal administration: it is one of eight cultural and architecture groups currently suing President Trump and the Kennedy Center board over the planned renovations of the complex, which are planned to start in July.
The memorial service will be held at the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial at 1 p.m.
A brave K-9 hero from the region will be honored at the Annual National Police K9 Memorial Service on Monday afternoon. (Roanoke Police Department)
WASHINGTON D.C. – A brave K-9 hero from the region will be honored at the Annual National Police K9 Memorial Service on Monday afternoon.
K-9 Knox died in the line of duty last year after he was accidentally hit by a police vehicle while pursuing a suspect involved in a stolen vehicle incident. He was a 3-year-old German shepherd and had served as a narcotics detection and patrol apprehension K-9 for the Roanoke Police Department since May 2023.
The memorial service will include a wreath-laying ceremony and will be held at the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial in Washington, D.C., at 1 p.m. The event will open with a musical performance by Frank Ray, and the guest speaker will be Deputy Jared Hahn of the Miami-Dade Sheriff’s Office K-9 Unit.
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The San Antonio Police Department Blue Line Choir will sing the national anthem, and the Emerald Society Pipes & Drums band will also perform.
Showers continue to move west with a cold front tonight. There will be a break in the rain overnight, but showers return for the start of the day on Monday. Monday afternoon will be dry, but noticeably cooler.
Sunshine returns Tuesday, but the break in the rain will be short-lived with rain chances on Wednesday
Download the NBC Washington app on iOS and Android to check the weather radar on the go.
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TONIGHT: Showers early Mostly cloudy Wind: N 5-10 mph LOW: Low 50s
