Amid the chaos of the Trump administration’s first few weeks in office, a court case regarding the president’s legal right to stop payment of nearly US$2 billion in U.S. Agency for International Development contracts poses an important legal question whose answer may show just how strong the country’s separation of powers actually is.
On Jan. 20, 2025, President Donald Trump issued an executive order pausing all foreign aid funding, most of which is administered by USAID. A little more than two weeks later, USAID laid off all but a few hundred of its 10,000 workers.
