Judge blocks Trump plan to put thousands of staff on leave

A judge temporarily prevented President Donald Trump from placing 2,200 workers at the US Agency for International Development (USAID) on paid leave, a few hours before this happened.

Judge Carl Nichols issued a “limited” temporary prohibition prescription, In response to a last minute trial filed by two unions trying to save the agency.

The order will remain in place for a week, until February 14 at midnight.

In addition, on Saturday, another federal judge prevented the Ministry of Elon Musk Government (DOGE) from access to the Treasury Department files which include the personal financial data of millions of Americans, reported the American media.

Trump argued that the USAID, the help agency abroad, is not a precious use of taxpayers money and wants to dismantle it. It plans to put almost the 10,000 employees of the agency on leave, with the exception of 611 workers.

Some 500 employees had already been put on administrative leave and 2,200 others were to join them from midnight Friday (05:00 GMT).

But the last -minute trial argued on Friday that the government violated the American Constitution and that workers suffered damage.

Judge Nichols has arranged on the side of the unions, saying that they would suffer “irreparable damage” if the court would not intervene, when there would be “no harm to the government”.

The order also restores the 500 employees already placed on administrative leave.

“All USAID employees currently on administrative leave must be reintegrated until this date, and will have full access to email, payment and security notification systems until this date, and no additional employees will be Put on administrative leave before this date “, Nichols wrote.

The judge will also examine a longer -term break in a hearing on Wednesday.

It is not clear to the court order which will happen to the remaining staff of the agency.

As the decision came, officials had removed and covered the USAID panels at the organization’s headquarters in Washington DC. THE agency website is also inaccessible, leading to a destination page on the staff cuts.

Usaid is the biggest donor of help in the world – With a large part of its budget spent on health programs worldwide. Two -thirds of its 10,000 employees work abroad.

This is one of the many federal agencies that her administration aims because she strives to reduce federal spending in the United States.

The Republican campaigned on the government’s revision and trained an advisory body appointed the government’s ministry of efficiency (DOGE) – led by the technological billionaire Elon Musk – to reduce the budget.

Friday decision by Judge Nichols came in response to an emergency petition by American Foreign Service Association and the American Federation of Government employees – two unions representing agency employees.

During the hearing, judge Nichols – who was appointed by Trump during his first mandate – did not seem likely to grant other requests within the framework of the trial, in particular to restore subsidies and contracts or reopen USAID buildings.

The legal action argued that the president violated the American Constitution and the Federal Law by trying to dismantle the agency.

“Not one of the actions of the defendants to dismantle the USAID was not taken in accordance with the authorization of the Congress,” he said.

“And in accordance with federal law, congress is the only entity that could legally dismantle the agency.”

Representing the Trump administration, Brett Shumate, head of the Ministry of Justice, told the judge that the president “had decided that there was corruption and fraud in the USAID”.

A few hours after Trump took office on January 20, he signed an executive decree interrupting any foreign assistance until such funds were checked and aligned on his “America First” policy.

This has led to a work stoppage at USAID, which manages health and emergency programs in around 120 countries, including in the poorest regions in the world.

“Usaid makes the radical who left crazy,” Trump posted on his social platform Truth.

“Corruption is at levels rarely seen before. Close it!”

But Samantha Power, who was the head of the USAID under former President Joe Biden, wrote in a scathing opinion article by the New York Times: “We are witnessing one of the blues the worst and the most expensive of Foreign policy of American history. “

The United States is by far the largest humanitarian aid supplier in the world. USAID’s budget amounts to around 40 billion dollars – approximately 0.6% of the total of US annual public spending of $ 6.75 billion.

The head of the United Nations program to fight HIV / AIDS told BBC that the cuts would have disastrous impacts around the world.

“AIDS deaths over the next five years will increase by 6.3 million” if funding is not restored, said Uusidas Executive Director Winnie Byanyima.

In a separate case, 19 prosecutors of state continued the Trump administration after Doge, a cost reduction initiative led by Musk, received Access to treasury files This included the personal financial data of Americans.

They asserted access to Musk, a “special government employee” and DOGE, which is not an official government department, violated the federal law.

Early Saturday, the American district judge Paul A. Engelmayer published a preliminary injunction to prohibit access and ordered Musk and his team to immediately destroy any copy of files.

The conditions are in place until the next court hearing on February 14.