(Top left) A doctor provides HIV testing and counseling to a pregnant couple in Malawi. (Bottom left) Nepalese soldiers carry supplies after a natural disaster. (Center) Beyond Access runs a literacy program in rural Bangladesh. (Top right) A nurse administers a vaccine in South Africa. (Bottom right) An emergency food distribution center at a refugee camp in Kenya. All images CC BY-NC 2.0

On January 20, 2025, US President Donald Trump signed an executive order freezing all US funding for foreign aid programs, including for USAID, the United States’ primary foreign aid agency, which spent over USD 68 billion on international aid in 2023. The move has sent the international humanitarian sector into complete disarray, as crucial anti-hunger, health, peacebuilding, and advocacy organizations lost funding overnight. 

USAID was founded in 1961 as a way to spread the US’s influence abroad and improve its reputation internationally. Since the program’s inception, the US government has been the single-largest aid donor in the world, making up about 40 percent of the global aid funding landscape. Much of the funding over the years has gone to programs such as aid in refugee camps and conflict zones, health education and vaccine campaigns, anti-poverty programs, emergency disaster relief support, and environmental protection. However, it is important to note that not all US foreign assistance — nor all the programs affected by the freeze — were administered by USAID.

With the immediate freeze of that funding, countless crucial NGOs have faced operational shutdowns that have had devastating impacts on the ground — particularly on vulnerable communities. Those affected include refugee hospitals on the Thai-Myanmar border that have had to halt services amid the freeze, leading to at least one death; HIV clinics in South Africa, where medical experts say the cut could lead to half a million deaths and countless new infections; and neonatal services in Nepal where local health organizations had been able to significantly reduce child mortality rates partly thanks to US funding.

Hundreds of thousands of humanitarian and NGO workers have also lost their jobs globally, offering a boon to authoritarian governments seeking to curb civil society work. In the Western Balkans, numerous civil society, human rights and independent media projects have been adversely affected, and some governments are using the turmoil to target and harass dissidents.

Protests have broken out in cities around the world to push back against the executive order, arguing that in not giving any warning for the funding cut, Trump's office has endangered millions of lives and decades of anti-poverty and health work.

While countless lawsuits over the freeze are still ongoing in the US, the situation remains volatile. The justifications for the freeze have ranged from misleading to outright lies, and that propaganda is harming international cooperation in ways that go beyond the freeze on funding. Misinformation abounds about where US funding was going and who is currently being affected. To combat this, Global Voices is launching a special coverage examining how the changes are affecting Global Majority nations and marginalized communities.