The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) is a statutory agency of the executive branch of the United States federal government. Founded in 1961, it was formerly the world's largest foreign aid agency. After major cutbacks in 2025, its remaining functions were transferred to the United States Department of State.

USAID was established to counter the influence of the Soviet Union during the Cold War by means of soft power. In 2025, the second Trump administration ended 83% of overall projects, transferred the rest to the State Department, and planned to disband the agency in September 2026. However, USAID had been reorganized by the United States Congress as an independent agency in 1998 and can only be formally abolished by an act of Congress. As such, it legally still exists.

From 2001 to 2024, USAID had an average budget of $23 billion a year and missions in over 100 countries in areas as diverse as global health, environmental protection, and democratic governance. In the twenty years from 2001 to 2021, USAID programs were estimated to save between 4.1 and 4.7 million lives each year.

History In August 1953, President Eisenhower reorganized country offices as "United States Operations Missions" (USOMs). Congress passed the Foreign Assistance Act on September 4, 1961, which reorganized U.S. foreign assistance programs and mandated the creation of an agency to administer economic aid. The goal of this agency was to counter Soviet influence during the Cold War and to advance U.S. soft power through socioeconomic development.

USAID's predecessor agency was already substantial, with 6,400 U.S. staff in developing-country field missions in 1961. Except for the peak years of the Vietnam War, 1965–70, that was more U.S. field staff than USAID would have in the future, and triple the number USAID has had in field missions in the years since 2000.

After his inauguration as president on January 20, 1961, John F. Kennedy created the Peace Corps by executive order on March 1, 1961. On March 22, he sent a special message to Congress on foreign aid, asserting that the 1960s should be a "Decade of Development" and proposing to unify U.S. development assistance administration into a single agency. He sent a proposed "Act for International Development" to Congress in May and the resulting "Foreign Assistance Act" was approved in September, repealing the Mutual Security Act. In November, Kennedy signed the act and issued an executive order tasking the secretary of state to create, within the State Department, the "Agency for International Development" (or A.I.D.: subsequently re-branded as USAID), as the successor to both ICA and the Development Loan Fund. With these actions, the U.S. created a permanent agency working with administrative autonomy under the policy guidance of the State Department to implement, through resident field missions, a global program of both technical and financial development assistance for low-income countries. After this transition, USOMs continued to exist for a time as an element of USAID.

In 1998, Congress established USAID as a functionally independent executive agency with the Foreign Affairs Reform and Restructuring Act, which gave the president 60 days to abolish or reorganize USAID. President Bill Clinton chose the second option and reorganized USAID, which retained its independence from the U.S. Department of State, although its administrator must "report to and be under the direct authority and foreign policy guidance of the Secretary of State".

During Trump's first term, his daughter Ivanka Trump, who served as Advisor to the President, used over $11,000 from USAID in 2019 to purchase video recording and reproducing equipment for a White House event. Both Ivanka and then-First Lady Melania Trump had publicly praised USAID's work during the first Trump administration. Melania Trump visited Africa in 2018, speaking about USAID's efforts and stating, "We care, and we want to show the world that we care, and I've partnered and am working with USAID." Ivanka Trump also toured Africa on behalf of USAID, lauding her father's creation of the "Women's Global Development and Prosperity" initiative and emphasizing its alignment with U.S. national security interests.

In the 21 years from 2001 to 2021 inclusive, USAID funding saved an estimated 92 million persons, with a range between 86 and 98 million. This is an estimated range of between 4.1 and 4.7 million lives saved per year. Among these lives saved were an estimated 30 million children younger than five, with a range between 26 and 35 million. This is an estimated range of between 1.2 and 1.7 million per year in the subset of children under five saved.Lancet, "Evaluating the impact . . . ", July 2025. These estimated ranges of lives saved have a 95% CI, meaning Confidence Interval. RR means Relative Risk, and an RR less than 1.0 means that the treatment group has a lower risk than the control group.

Trump administration cuts

On January 24, 2025, during the second Trump administration, President Donald Trump ordered a near-total freeze on all foreign aid.President Trump signed Executive Order 14169 directing a near-total freeze on foreign aid. Multiple lawsuits were filed against the Trump administration alleging that these actions were not within its powers without congressional authorization.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio issued a waiver for humanitarian aid, and a key issue developed over whether this waiver was actually translating into aid flowing. On March 10, 2025, Marco Rubio announced that the Trump administration had concluded its review, and 83% of USAID's programs would be cancelled, involving approximately 5,200 contracts.

The impact of the actions taken by the USAID on global health is wide-reaching. A study published in June 2025 estimated that funding cuts and the abolition of the agency could result in more than 14 million preventable deaths by 2030, including 4.5 million children under 5 years old. Another estimate (by epidemiologist and health economist Brooke Nichols) is that over a period of one year from when they began, the cuts will result in the deaths of as many as 262,915 adults and 518,428 children.

Absorption by State Department On March 28, 2025, U.S. secretary of state Rubio notified Congress that USAID would be dissolved and absorbed into the U.S. State Department. Since July 1, 2025, USAID's operations have ceased and U.S. foreign assistance has now been administered by the U.S. State Department.

USAID employees were not automatically transferred. Instead, the State Department is engaging in a "separate and independent hiring process".

Competition with China As USAID projects were withdrawn in 2025, Chinese officials were reported to be expressing willingness to fill resultant funding gaps in some countries, increasing concerns in the US that the US was ceding influence while China also continues its global infrastructure investment through the Belt and Road Initiative.

Disaster response Regarding the March 28 Myanmar earthquake, a U.S. State Department spokesperson stated that the United States is working through local partners in Myanmar, and said, "The success in the work and our impact will still be there." However, a former USAID mission head in Myanmar said, "This is the new normal. This is what it looks like when the United States sits on the international sidelines, when the United States is a weaker international player, when it cedes the space to other global players like China."

Purposes USAID's decentralized network of resident field missions was drawn on to manage U.S. government programs in low-income countries for various purposes. Disaster relief Poverty relief Technical cooperation on global issues, including the environment U.S. bilateral interests Socioeconomic development

Disaster relief

Some of the U.S. government's earliest foreign aid programs provided relief in war-created crises. In 1915, U.S. government assistance through the Commission for Relief in Belgium headed by Herbert Hoover prevented starvation in Belgium after the German invasion. After 1945, the European Recovery Program championed by Secretary of State George Marshall (the "Marshall Plan") helped rebuild war-torn Western Europe.

Poverty relief

After 1945, many newly independent countries needed assistance to relieve the chronic deprivation afflicting their low-income populations. USAID and its predecessor agencies have continuously provided poverty relief in many forms, including assistance to public health and education services targeted at the poorest. USAID has also helped manage food aid provided by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Also, USAID provides funding to NGOs to supplement private donations in relieving chronic poverty.

Global issues Technical cooperation between nations is essential for addressing a range of cross-border concerns like communicable diseases, environmental issues, trade and investment cooperation, safety standards for traded products, money laundering, and so forth. The United States has specialized federal agencies dealing with such areas, such as the Centers for Disease Control and the Environmental Protection Agency. USAID's special ability to administer programs in low-income countries supported these and other U.S. government agencies' international work on global concerns.

Environment Among these global interests, environmental issues attracted high attention. USAID assisted projects that conserve and protect threatened land, water, forests, and wildlife. USAID also assists projects in reducing greenhouse gas emissions and building resilience to the risks associated with global climate change. U.S. environmental regulation laws require that programs sponsored by USAID should be both economically and environmentally sustainable.

U.S. national interests Congress appropriates exceptional financial assistance to allies to support U.S. geopolitical interests, mainly in the form of "Economic Support Funds" (ESF). USAID is called on to administer the bulk (90%) of ESF and is instructed: "To the maximum extent feasible, [to] provide [ESF] assistance ... consistent with the policy directions, purposes, and programs of [development assistance]."

Also, when U.S. troops were in the field, USAID could supplement the "Civil Affairs" programs that the U.S. military conducts to win the friendship of local populations. In these circumstances, USAID may be directed by specially appointed diplomatic officials of the State Department, as has been done in Afghanistan and Pakistan during operations against al-Qaeda.

U.S. commercial interests were served by U.S. law's requirement that most goods and services financed by USAID must be sourced from U.S. vendors. American farms supplied about 41 percent of the food aid according to a 2021 report by the Congressional Research Service.

Socioeconomic development To help low-income nations achieve self-sustaining socioeconomic development, USAID assisted them in improving the management of their own resources. USAID's assistance for socioeconomic development mainly provided technical advice, training, scholarships, commodities, and financial assistance. Through grants and contracts, USAID mobilized the technical resources of the private sector and other U.S. government agencies, universities, and NGOs to participate in this assistance.

Programs of the various types above frequently reinforced one another. For example, the Foreign Assistance Act required USAID to use funds appropriated for geopolitical purposes ("Economic Support Funds") to support socioeconomic development to the maximum extent possible.

Organization

USAID is organized around country development programs managed by resident USAID offices in developing countries ("USAID missions"), supported by USAID's global headquarters in Washington, D.C.

Country development programs